


But That's History

by ebbet



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Black Hermione Granger, Curricular Reform, Desi Harry Potter, Early 2000s Music is Very Important, Fascism, Flirting, H/D Fan Fair 2019, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Harry Potter Thinks Draco Malfoy is Up to Something, History of Magic Class (Harry Potter), Hogwarts, Humor, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Internalized Homophobia, LGBTQ Themes, M/M, Minor Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, Minor Luna Lovegood/Ginny Weasley, Muggle Studies, Mutual Pining, Oblivious Harry Potter, Post-Hogwarts, Professor Draco Malfoy, Professor Harry Potter, Redeemed Draco Malfoy, Secondary Theme: Book Fair, Slow Build Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, The Bi Who Lived
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-01
Updated: 2019-12-01
Packaged: 2020-10-13 10:04:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 54,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20580731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ebbet/pseuds/ebbet
Summary: Harry Potter starts his first year as Muggle Studies Professor only to find that Draco Malfoy has been hired to teach History of Magic.





	1. An Unexpected Announcement

**Author's Note:**

> For Prompt #[13](https://docs.google.com/document/d/16er_sVwwFtbVQxtiFqHRWhw09kwNYhywsB-R48qtVPU/edit#).
> 
> To whoever submitted this prompt, I hope I've done it justice. 
> 
> To all my beta readers (a, e, e, e, g, h, k, m) thank you so, so much. Your brainstorming, comments, and instantaneous recall of HP plot, trivia, and magical theory helped me build this world consistently and with love and compassion.Thank you for giving up a significant chunk of August and September to editing a fic that got ... a bit long. I wouldn't have been able to do it without you. 
> 
> Some HPHM spoilers for up to Year 6, Chapter 3. I've mostly just lifted the characters I love. 
> 
> I’ve taken a loose and spicy approach to canon, despite my betas' best efforts. Die mad.

September first dawned bright and cold. Harry pulled back the drapes from the window and stared out across the Black Lake, reflecting the crisp blue of the sky. It was the first time he’d woken up on September first already at Hogwarts. A tingle of anticipation ran down his spine. His first year as a professor. 

Eight years ago, he’d started his final year as a student—the first year he’d had at Hogwarts where no one was actively trying to kill him. Then he’d muddled about as an Auror for a year before realizing that he’d loved Dumbledore’s Army because of the teaching, not the fighting. Harry started with muggle primary schools, then went to wizarding uni for education. Now he was two masters’ degrees and years of student teaching stronger. And he was ready to take on Hogwarts.

Sentimentality before breakfast. Who would have thought. Harry shrugged his shoulders, smiling at the vision outside his window, and ambled across the room and looked at himself in the mirror.

He laughed at his reflection. Same wild hair, same thin-rimmed round glasses, same scars. Same tall, skinny frame—he was now suspecting that he’d never put on weight, despite a heavy diet of treacle tarts and steak and kidney pie since he arrived in August. 

The kids wouldn’t be arriving until later, so he left his professorial robe hanging by the door and went down to breakfast in a flannel and jeans. 

The silence of the Great Hall was broken by a gentle clinking of cutlery from the high table. 

“Ah, Harry,” Minerva McGonagall smiled up at him and gestured to an empty seat on her left. As he sat, Prof—no, Filius—poured him a cup of tea and passed him the sugar bowl and creamer.

“Tomorrow you might need the coffee,” the older man said conspiratorially. “I can never sleep before the first day of classes.”

“We’ll see.” Harry smiled at Pomona, who nodded at him over the pages of the _Prophet. _He pulled a rack of toast towards himself and began eating steadily and voraciously, pouring copious amounts of ketchup over his scrambled eggs and fried tomato. None of the other young professors came to the Great Hall for breakfast, preferring tea sent to their rooms, but Harry loved a full English. 

Minerva cleared her throat. 

“Harry, if we could have a word after breakfast.”

Fighting the urge to respond with an honorific, Harry nodded. His mouth was too full of toast to open. 

Some twenty minutes later, Filius and Pomona had drifted away from the breakfast table. Minerva set down her teacup and stared evenly at her youngest professor. 

“As you know, the professorship for History of Magic has not yet been announced. Since Cuthbert had been with us for over forty years before we convinced him to retire this past May, we have had some trouble finding a good match for the school.”

She paused here and steepled her fingers together. Harry busied himself with pouring some more tea. She declined with a gentle shake of the head. He dropped a sugar cube in and reached for the creamer. 

“We found a suitable candidate in June, but due to his personal circumstances, he was not able to arrive until this evening with the students. The other members of the faculty and staff already know this, but I did not want to disturb you during your preparations for your first year of teaching.”

Harry nodded. “Thanks, but I doubt it’s going to throw me off that much.”

“Well,” Minerva said slowly. “I think you might rather want to know who it is before making such assumptions.” 

“Who is it, then?”

“Draco Malfoy.”

Harry’s head began to pound. Clenching his fists under the table, he sputtered, “Malfoy? Here? Teaching?” He tried to practice his deep breathing techniques, but he felt the anger rising. 

Minerva nodded several times. “Professor Malfoy has changed since his—” she seemed to be searching for a word—"misspent teen years at this institution.” 

Harry shoved his chair away from the table and stood. “He tried to kill Dumbledore! He took the Mark! He hasn’t changed, and he’s probably still a snarky little arse who can’t wait to—” he was spluttering and his vision swam as he smacked a hand on the table—“inculcate the youth with his racist, sexist, homophobic, blood purist ideas, and I can’t believe—”

The older professor held up a hand. “Please, Harry. I know you have it in you to forgive him. He deserves a second chance.”

_As fucking if._

“If he even insinuates that my curriculum is unnecessary or if he steps one toe out of line, I’m not holding back, Minerva. Things have changed.” He slammed his hand down on the table again. The noise echoed throughout the Great Hall. A lone elf polishing the crest on the fireplace squeaked. 

“You’re right, Harry. Things have changed. We have all changed.” Her conciliatory tone only set him off further. “No one else had an objection to Professor Malfoy’s appointment. His graduate work at the Magical University in Mainz was very impressive, and he is more than qualified.”

Harry started pacing. 

“Everyone else knew? You told them all and you didn’t think I should know? No one, no one has as much history as I do with that twat. No one knows him like I do. He tried to kill Dumbledore!” 

“Harry, he did not succeed in killing Albus,” she said and drank her tea. This statement did not seem to reach him at all. Minerva watched him pace back and forth, grabbing handfuls of hair and yanking on them. It did not make a noticeable difference to his hairstyle. 

“How do you know he’s changed? He’s good at lying. He probably doesn’t even know that much about the History of Magic anyway, outside of all the pureblood lies his father told him when he was little. I doubt he even paid any attention during Binns’ lessons anyway—”

“Harry, did you?”

He paused and took a short breath. “I learned enough to destroy the Horcruxes.”

Minerva raised an eyebrow.

“Yes, well, anyway, Hermione learned a lot from Binns and I doubt Malfoy will be able to teach one-fifth as well as he could.”

Minerva raised her other eyebrow. “I doubt Ms. Granger gained much from Cuthbert’s lessons.” 

“Well, she might have learned most of it in _Hogwarts: A History_, but Binns was an institution here. Malfoy can’t replace him.”

Minerva cleared her throat and stood. “Harry, this outburst is exactly why I chose not to tell you before. Now you only have six hours to contemplate Draco’s wickedness before the young devil himself appears. Wasn’t that kind of me?” 

Harry crossed his arms. “Rather generous.”

“We can hardly fire him before he’s started, Potter,” she finished tartly, folding her napkin and laying it on the table. “Try giving him a second chance. If only to keep the peace at faculty meetings.”

“Fine, Minerva, but don’t think I’m done with this topic; he’s still a piece of—” 

Harry looked up to find the table empty and Minerva striding out of the Great Hall. To preserve his dignity he chose not to run after her. 

He flopped back into his chair and sighed. 

“Well, fuck.” 

Another cup of tea was certainly in order.


	2. The First Sighting

Seven hours later the Great Hall rebounded with noise as the students caught up with friends after a long summer away. Harry rested his chin in his hand and pretended to not notice the stares directed his way at the head table. He had made an attempt with his hair and was buttoned into his navy-blue robes. 

Even the other faculty and staff seemed to be buzzing with excitement. He looked around and noted each of his peers, from Filius and Pomona at the far end, to the nattily-dressed Flying instructor Andre Egwu, deep in discussion with Defense Against the Dark Arts professor and Head of Hufflepuff Audrey Oliver-Winger, a plump woman with a tangle of silvery hair escaping from a crown of braids and flowers, just about the last person anyone would assume had experience in the Dark Arts. They had been at Hogwarts together in Charlie’s year and were as thick as thieves. Mr. and Mrs. Hardbroom, the head of the hospital wing and the librarian respectively, conferred with Mervyn Pentangle, who taught Divination. Bastian Khan, the Head of Slytherin and current Professor of Ancient Runes, seemed to be lecturing transfiguration professor Adelaide Murton. She rested her chin on one hand and twirled one of her long braids around her finger and nodded occasionally. Bastian had passed the coaching role of Slytherin’s Quidditch team over to Addie at the end of last year, and he still had very definite ideas. 

“’Arry, where are you?” Hagrid leaned towards him and smiled. “You’re a bit odd this evening.”

Padma Patil, who had taught potions for the past five years after graduating from Oxford with a first in magical chemistry, laughed and shook her head. “Hagrid, he’s worrying about Draco already.” 

“What? No,” Harry said, rubbing his sweating palms across his knees.

“You keep looking at that empty chair, which is clearly the one he’s going to sit in, since it’s not the Headmaster’s chair, so,” she shrugged and adjusted her pointed black hat. “Why aren’t you wearing a hat? Didn’t they tell you we’re supposed to wear hats on the first evening? Look all witchy and intimidating to the ickle firsties.” Harry snorted. For all of Padma’s guff, she seemed to be wildly popular among the students. Lots of them had waved to her. 

Hagrid patted Harry on the shoulder and almost sent him into the table. “Don’t worry, ‘Arry, he’s changed.”

Harry took a deep breath. “I don’t know if the two of you know who you’re dealing with. This is Malfoy. Malfoy!”

Padma and Hagrid exchanged looks. 

“You know, Slytherins aren’t all bad. Look at Addie and Bastian.”

Harry narrowed his eyes and shook his head. “You have a crush on Addie, Padma, and that doesn’t excuse the rest of them. Well, Khan is fine. He’s older. He’s also not white or a pureblood, so he’s practically guaranteed to be at least half decent. But Malfoy—”

A silence spread across the Great Hall as the doors creaked open. 

Minerva McGonagall led in the first years, who shuffled together in a wobbly line. They were so small. He was never that small. They huddled behind her as she smiled beatifically at the rest of the school and gestured towards the Sorting Hat, which began to sing. 

That’s when he saw a shock of white-blond hair.

His world narrowed. 

Malfoy lurked in the shadows of the large doors behind the first years. He turned to Padma for confirmation of this nefarious behavior but whipped his head back so quickly he missed her small smirk. Harry squinted and once again wished he could magically improve his vision. All he could tell from here was that Malfoy was all in black. Just like Snape. Suspicious already. He was much taller than the first years, but that didn’t mean much. They were eleven. 

The Sorting passed quickly. Harry didn’t even notice who was sorted into his own house. That was Hagrid’s job, anyway; he was the Head of Gryffindor.

Malfoy hung behind Minerva the entire time. 

After the Hat declared Zinnias, Zebbediah to be a Slytherin, the Great Hall resounded with applause. Minerva took her place in front of the high table. Malfoy slipped into the empty seat at the far end. Harry still couldn’t really see him clearly, but his black robes dragged across the floor. This was a school, not a fashion show. His white-blond hair was no longer slicked back but cropped closely and marginally less shellacked than his teen years, and the shadowy glow of a beard softened his pointed chin. 

“Following in the pointed shoes of my predecessor Albus Dumbledore, I shall save the speechmaking for after dinner. For now, enjoy.” She clapped her hands and the tables sagged with roasts, potatoes, sprouts, jugs of pumpkin juice, rolls, and a plethora of steaming dishes.

Malfoy shook hands with Filius and Pomona and looked down the table, nodding at each professor in turn—he knew them from the interview, the rat bastard—until he got to Harry. Malfoy’s smile went a bit stiff and then broadened. Harry gave him a quick two-fingered salute and then turned to his roasted sprouts. _Fuck Malfoy and his fake conviviality._ Just wait until Ron and Hermione heard about this; he hoped his owl had made it to their cottage. They must be home by now. But they both worked late, so Christ knows when they’d actually read his (absolutely livid and practically illegible) note. 

Padma elbowed him. “I saw that, you prat.” She glanced around to make sure no one was paying attention to them and whispered, “You’re lucky Minnie’s too involved with her roast beef to notice.”

“Well, excuse me, Miss Politeness Patil.” He stabbed a chunk of potato. She rolled her eyes and turned to talk to Hagrid about harvesting Flobberworm slime. 

Harry attempted to stare straight forward and look to his left to watch Malfoy at the same time. It was giving him a headache. Malfoy didn’t seem to be doing anything too untoward yet, just seducing people with his fake personality and his shiny hair. And worse, Malfoy wasn’t wearing a hat. His hatlessness was breaking the rules already. He intended to mention this to Padma, but she was staunchly ignoring him in favor of Hagrid and Flobberworms. Dinner and Minerva’s speech passed in a blur. He stood and waved when introduced (did he really need an introduction?), as did Malfoy. There was applause for him and for Malfoy, which seemed a bit insane. Only one of them had saved the wizarding world. 

The Heads of House—Filius, Audrey, Hagrid, and Bastian—led their first years from the Great Hall. The other students vanished in a stampede, and the teachers rose, nodding to each other as they headed to their quarters. Tired of waiting for Malfoy to finish his coffee (so he could follow him and make sure there wasn’t anything suspicious), Harry finally stood. 

“Harry,” Minerva called, “I was wondering if you could show Draco to the young professors’ accommodations.” 

“What.” Harry said stupidly. “Why can’t Padma?”

Malfoy raised his eyebrows and smirked. “Padma seems to have left already, Potter.”

Harry whirled around. Damn it, Padma. He felt the color rise in his cheeks. 

“Still blessed with keen observational skills, I see.” Malfoy folded his napkin and placed it under his saucer. He smoothed his hair and stood. His black robes stretched across his now broad shoulders and fell without wrinkles in a long swoosh of dark fabric. 

“See you boys in the morning,” Minerva said, her eyes twinkling, even in the shadow of her wide-brimmed pointed hat. Harry narrowed his eyes at her. 

Harry exited the Great Hall without looking back. Malfoy was still shorter than him. He could run to catch up. Put his wee legs to good use. He wouldn’t speak first, he decided. Let Malfoy beg for his friendship.

“Running away already?” came the arch voice. “Didn’t think you’d surrender so easily.”

Harry didn’t turn. “I’m not running. It’s not my fault you never grew.” 

“It’s true, not all of us are blessed with your lanky physique. Some of us have lifted weights occasionally in the past eight years.” 

“Counting the days since you saw me last, Malfoy?” Harry took the stairs two at a time. He vaguely wondered what Malfoy had been doing for those eight years. He hadn’t shown up for eighth year. None of the Slytherins had. Hermione felt particularly put out by that—“it’s not a very good reintegration into society, if they don’t feel safe enough to return to Hogwarts”—but Harry couldn’t find himself to care. Much. He kept imagining he saw Malfoy turning around corners. But here he was, in the flesh, no longer an apparition. 

There was no labored breathing behind him. Just a moment of silence before Malfoy passed him. Malfoy paused at the top of the staircase, his hair perfectly in place. The torchlight was probably disguising the patchiness of his closely-cropped beard. 

“Which way now, Potter?” 

Harry laughed in an attempt to cover his exhaustion. Eight hours of daily lesson planning all summer hadn’t left him much time for flying. He’d just sprinted up a whole flight of stairs. He waved his hand to the left. Malfoy set off, nodding to the portraits along the way. The oil-painted figures whispered and tittered. Harry loped along the corridor until he was shoulder-to-shoulder, well, shoulder-to-mid-upper-arm, with Malfoy. 

He fought the urge to shove Malfoy into the wall. _Collegiality, Potter_, he thought, _keep calm and ignore Malfoy_. It was going to become his mantra, he could already tell. 

“Up here, on the left.” He announced the password—earwig—to a dour fourteenth-century jester whose portrait swung to the side to reveal a polished wooden door and a spiral stone staircase.

“This whole tower is for the unmarried professors or, like, those who don’t want to live outside the castle, though I think Mervyn just sleeps in the Div classroom. We each get a floor. Padma’s on the top, then it’s Addie, Andre when he’s not off in Glasgow, then me, and I guess you’re on the bottom floor. Well, this floor. It’s not the ground floor. The stairs go up around the rooms. I think the castle expands if there are more profs who want to live here. Or shrinks, depending. That’s how the castle tends to work.” All this flowed out of him, unchecked. He was going to be strong and silent. That was the plan. But this was just information. Necessary to know so Malfoy wouldn’t end up in the wrong room and frighten the ladies. Though Padma and Addie probably had fiercer Bat-Bogey hexes than he did.

Malfoy had one hand on the brass knob. A silver ring glinted in the light from the candles along the staircase. Harry felt he shouldn’t leave without giving Malfoy a warning. That he was watching him. That he’d know if he got up to something tonight, or any night. 

“Waiting to give me a goodnight kiss, Potter?” 

Harry’s eye twitched. He spun on his heel and spit, “As if, Malfoy. I’m watching you.” 

“I’ll have to keep you entertained, then, won’t I?” 

Shooting him another two-fingered salute, Harry leapt up the stairs. His heart was racing by the time he reached his own door. His hands were shaking as he turned the knob. This was mental, absolutely mental. He ran a bath and examined his undressed body in the mirror. What the fuck did that tosser mean by lanky. He was fit. He’d pulled before. Even after Ginny, he could get blokes in Muggle clubs. Loads of blokes. Whenever he wanted. They didn’t know he was famous. He narrowed his eyes and flexed. Fuck Malfoy. 

The bath was nice, but he couldn’t stop pacing. _Nerves about the first day, that’s all_, he told himself over and over. Ron and Hermione hadn’t written him back. Tangled in his sheets. Sweating. His hands hadn’t stopped sweating. He ripped his pajama top off. He rested his head against the window. It fogged. The Black Lake shimmered in the moonlight.

How could Malfoy get under his skin so quickly?


	3. The Hamlet Incident

The first few weeks of term passed smoothly. Harry’s ears perked up when his fifth-years came into his class on Tuesdays—directly after a double period with Malfoy—but he couldn’t glean much. They seemed chipper. They must be sleeping through Malfoy’s tedious lessons. 

Since Muggle Studies was now a required course from first year to fifth and an elective for the sixth and seventh years, Harry had his hands full. His summer had been devoted to developing seven years of curriculum for both Muggle-born and wizard-born students. Where Charity Burbage had favored bone-dry essay prompts (“Why do Muggles need electricity?”), Harry chose to introduce his kids to Velcro and ballpoint pens, assign debates on the flat earth theory (How did some wizards still believe this? If the earth wasn’t a globe, how would Astronomy even work?), and introduce the fifth-years and above to the wonders of rap, R&B, and indie music. Irritated that he still hadn’t figured out a way to make computers work at Hogwarts—the CD player he picked up in Edinburgh only worked when thumped three times and given a little _Lumos _encouragement, which was the closest thing to electricity he’d come up with—Harry finished drawing a diagram of a computer on the blackboard for his afternoon class and pulled down a map of Britain just seconds before a giggling mob of fifteen-year-olds streamed into his classroom. 

Untangling themselves and settling into the half-circle of desks, the Gryffindors and Ravenclaws searched for quills and parchment. Next year, Harry was asking for funding for proper notebooks, loose-leaf paper, and ballpoints for his students. Scrolls were always leaping out of his arms and were impossible to stack. And sputtering quills and giant ink blots didn’t help their atrocious handwriting. 

“Alright, today we’re covering _Hamlet_—” 

Elspeth Montague’s hand shot into the air. “Sir, we’ve already done _Hamlet_.”

Harry held up his hands. “What, what, what?” They were following the syllabus exactly, and this week they were doing Shakespeare. Were these the sixth years? No, no, there were Justin and Perry arguing quietly in the back of the classroom, and Elspeth was definitely a fifth year. She’d been coming in after classes to discuss the Muggle Studies O.W.L. since the second day of school. She was positive that since she’d been born into a wizarding family in Hong Kong, she was doubly disadvantaged regarding British Muggle life. Harry had tried hinting to her that she needn’t worry because he was the one who’d rewritten the O.W.L. for the Ministry over the summer and therefore knew the test backwards and forwards. 

Elspeth folded her hands and pressed them together. “Sir, we did it with Professor Malfoy last week.”

Harry’s vision clouded. “You what?” 

“We have a whole unit on Shakespeare because the Muggles think he was a Muggle, but there are some recent theories that he may have been a Squib, so—” she broke off as Britney Smith elbowed her in the side. “Britney!” she hissed. “We did! We just learned this!” 

Britney—the resident Muggle-born expert on all cosmetics and beauty techniques and one of Gryffindor's Beaters—whispered back, “Can’t you see he’s like, flipping out?” 

Harry had gone to the blackboard and was staring fixedly at the map. Maybe he could kill Malfoy and then escape to the Hebrides. He could live alone on one of those small islands. Maybe Malaga. That would be sunnier. Visions of bloodied knives and umbrella drinks swam in his mind’s eye. 

He took a deep breath and turned back to the class. 

“So, what, exactly, did you learn with Professor Malfoy? Elspeth, let’s let someone else give the summarized version—Perry?” 

Perry almost jumped out of his seat. He pulled on one of his blonde curls and stuttered, “Uh, he, we, Shakespeare?” 

Harry raised his eyebrows and ran his hands through his hair. Perry was really going to have to pay more attention if he wanted to pass the O.W.L. He was almost sure Perry had some kind of learning disorder, but as far as he knew, wizards didn’t seem to recognize alternative learning strategies, though that was definitely why his classes were mostly discussion and hands-on activities. Too much lecturing disadvantaged kids who struggled with paying attention. “Britney?”

“Ok, so, Professor Malfoy told us all about the Globe Theater, and I had to go on this field trip in my Muggle primary so I kind of knew a lot about it already, but he made this like, magical model of it that showed like how they moved through the space, and like, how all the seating areas were separated by class and cost and stuff, and how they threw rotten shi—er, fruit—at the actors when they thought it sucked, so that was cool, and then we talked about the most famous plays, like _Hamlet_ and _Othello_ and _Midsummer Night’s Dream,_ and, like _The_ _Tempest_?” 

“And _Romeo and Juliet_,” Elspeth supplied.

“Yeah, and that one, which is totally stupid; they’re such idiots. Just like, ask her if she has some magical drug or something before you stab yourself, Romeo. Or just give it like five. Jesus.” Britney rolled her eyes and tapped her ballpoint on her desk.

Perry broke in. “Professor Malfoy also told us about how they wouldn’t let women go on stage so all the roles were played by men and some people think Christopher Marlowe actually wrote the plays, but he said that’s a load of rubbish.” 

Harry had leaned back against his desk and was drumming his fingers. “Interesting, interesting.” 

“But, like, it’s fine if we do _Hamlet _again,” Britney said in a conciliatory tone, examining her split ends. “We didn’t really discuss the themes or literary content in depth, so, like, there’s a lot still to be said about such a rich play.” Elspeth looked disgruntled. Harry knew there was an essay about Shakespeare on the O.W.L., and he didn’t trust Malfoy’s interpretation of the Bard. 

Justin raised his hand and Harry nodded at him.

“Professor Malfoy didn’t explain like, why Hamlet feels so bad about killing Polonius. Shuo asked him twice and he like, didn’t respond. He went all pale and then got really red and started talking about how Puck is a queer-coded character.”

Probably because that murder reminded him too much of his own goddamn life, Harry almost shot back, but he bit his lip. “Ok, well, let’s try something different.” He levitated copies of the play towards them. “Everyone take a copy and we’ll do a read through—Perry, you’re Hamlet for the first and second act, and Shuo, you’re Hamlet from the third to fifth; Justin, Ophelia; Elspeth, Gertrude; Britney, Claudius; Isla, Polonius; Oscar, Laertes; I’ll hand out the rest of the parts as they come up. I’ll do the stage directions.”

They weren’t supposed to do this for two weeks. This had absolutely ruined his lesson planning. He’d have to move forward the staging, which meant costumes, which meant his weekend would be spent magicking up panniers and hose. Malfoy was going to pay for this. 

After a vigorous class, since Britney insisted that they all get up and act it out “properly, because Shakespeare is so physical” that included Justin refusing to sing Ophelia’s song and attempting to beat box it instead, a startlingly charged scene between Claudius and Gertrude, and actual wailing over Yorick’s skull, Harry collapsed into his desk chair. 

“Essays due on Hamlet’s characterization next class. Two feet.” Grumbling ensued, but they all filed out and left Harry in silence. Twirling his quill, he hunched over his desk and began to plan.

“Terrible posture, as always, Potter.” 

Malfoy was there, in Harry’s classroom, swanning about in his stupid flowy black robes. He struck a pose by the bookshelf and stared Harry down. His hair was freaking sparkling. Did he use broom polish on it?

“At least I don’t have a stick up my—”

Malfoy tutted and Harry panicked; he sounded just like Umbridge and Harry was mentally thrown back into detention with the horrible woman. Rubbing the scar on his hand, he tried to do some breathing to prevent the trigger from turning into full-on panic. His Muggle therapist Donovan had taught him 4-7-8 breathing and he closed his eyes and briefly envisioned his escape to Malaga. 

“Ass like you, Malfoy,” he gasped. He’d be damned if he didn’t finish his insult thanks to an ill-timed flashback. Piña coladas, Potter, imagine the maraschino on the end of the paper umbrella. And the tiny slice of pineapple. Maybe he could kill Malfoy and flee. Just him and a beach and tiny cocktail umbrellas. 

Malfoy tilted his head. “You don’t even know what my ass is like, Potter.” He sauntered closer and leaned across Harry’s desk. 

Harry saw the flecks of gold in his grey eyes. Malfoy’s eyelashes were so long and almost clear? How had he never noticed that before? How was it possible to have hair that didn’t seem to have any color? A woody scent wafted across the six inches between them. Harry’s mouth went dry. He attempted to swallow. 

Malfoy licked his lips. “It’s gotten lots of compliments, you know,” he almost purred. 

“Yeah, I’m sure those pureblooded witches really dig this whole—” Harry managed to make a kind of frantic hand gesture—“whatever it is.” Malfoy’s ring wasn’t on the right finger for a wedding ring, it looked more like a signet, but surely, he had to be engaged to some fellow blood purist. 

Malfoy’s grin vanished. Stabbing one very pointy finger into Harry’s shoulder, he hissed, “You don’t understand anything, do you, Potter?” 

“Fuck off, Malfoy.” This was back to where Harry was comfortable, this prickly, obscure Draco who made vague half-claims and vindictive threats. Just like he had when he was a teenager. Malfoy whirled around.

“Why are you here, anyway?”

Malfoy’s back was ramrod straight.

“I thought we could discuss various educational goals that our courses seem to share. And this little club of yours.”

The snide tone in his voice made Harry leap to his feet. 

“How dare you—” 

“Potter,” Malfoy said and turned slowly.

“Just because a lot of wizards and witches have a hard time accepting that not everyone’s as straight as a fucking board doesn’t mean these kids should think they’re abnormal—”

“Potter.” Malfoy held up a hand. God, his fingers were so long? And he had such broad palms? His robe fell down around his elbow and revealed a starched white sleeve. With cufflinks. Shiny silver cufflinks. Fucking prick.

“Don’t interrupt me, Malfoy.” Harry spat. “Just because you don’t think gay kids matter doesn’t mean that you can stop me or spread your blood purist homophobia at Hogwarts, because this is a safe place for all, and—” 

“I am the last person you should accuse of homophobia.”

“Sure, Malfoy, sure.” Harry balled his hands into fists and released his fingers in an effort to not smack the small smile off Malfoy’s face. 

“Potter. Come now.”

Harry squinted at Malfoy. What was he hinting at? Why was he smiling? 

“Merlin, you’re obtuse.”

Malfoy raised his practically non-existent eyebrows.

“It’s not that complicated, Potter. I’m definitely, definitely not homophobic because I’m …” he trailed off and held out one hand in Harry’s direction. 

“Uh … you’re … not straight?”

“Got it in one, Potter.” Malfoy could somehow blink sarcastically. His arms were folded across his chest, which seemed to stretch his robes even tighter across his shoulders. Was he wearing some kind of stretch velvet? Had elastic finally made it to pureblood couture? 

“Anyway, since these students could clearly use someone who has more than half a brain to guide them through the complicated process of coming out in magical society—”

“What are you, then?” 

Harry felt very stupid in the silence that stretched between them.

“Gay, Potter, very fucking gay. I’ve known since I was eleven.” 

Malfoy’s grey eyes were boring into his, daring Harry to say something cruel in response. Harry wanted to ask how a fucking blood purist could be so seemingly confident in his identity as a gay man. But what came out was, 

“But—Parkinson?”

Malfoy rolled his eyes. “Pansy is a very close friend who I would never, ever sleep with for a variety of reasons, including that her family has absolutely no money, she lives in London throughout the entire year, even summers, and she thinks hot yoga cures everything.” He paused and shuddered. “It’s disgusting. All that sweating.”

Harry’s world was shifting quite a bit to the left. He shook his head. No, Malfoy was still there, examining one (perfectly manicured) hand and seemingly waiting politely for him to respond. Well, he definitely might have to hold off on murdering Malfoy, because it wouldn’t look good to his larger project of promoting tolerance to murder a fellow queer wizard, even if he was a fascist. (Or maybe a former fascist. But that remained to be seen.)

“As I was saying,” he began again, “These children need someone who has extensive experience with LGTBQIA issues specifically within the wizarding world, and while I appreciate your enthusiasm and willingness to support them as an ally, I have spent the last several years—” 

“Wait, what?” 

Malfoy’s brow wrinkled. “Which part confuses your miniscule brain?”

“I’m not an ally.” Harry said. “I’m bi.”

Malfoy took a step backwards and tripped a bit on his robe. 

“You—what—” he hissed. 

Harry laughed. “You didn’t know? The whole ‘Bi-Who-Lived’ series of articles in the Prophet? I run a foundation to help orphaned LGTBQIA witches and wizards? I did a nude calendar? With pygmy puffs tastefully covering certain bits? I’m sure I have a copy of it somewhere, if you’d like …”

“You—what—nude—” Malfoy was sputtering now. His pale skin was flushed from his cheeks all the way down to the tight black collar encircling his neck.

Harry rolled his eyes. “What, are you biphobic or something? Don’t think bi is gay enough? Think I ought to be ashamed?” He was enjoying Malfoy’s flustered expression. “I did think the third puff was a bit low, but Luna assured me that my uh, lower torso would increase sales. I’m still not sure about that, but, you know, gotta please Luna.” 

Malfoy drew himself up, took a deep breath, and crossed his arms. His voice sounded a bit thinner than usual as he said, “I spent the last years in exile from wizarding Britain and seem to have missed the spectacle of your coming out, Potter.” 

There was a silence. Harry fought the urge to laugh again and leaned against his desk, wiping his hands on his pants. Malfoy didn’t know. What a self-involved ass, honestly. As if they didn’t have wizarding papers in—wherever he had been. 

“Yeah, well, I am a whole bisexual wizard. That’s why I started the club in eighth year. It didn’t exist before, even though there’s been quiet meetings of gay witches and wizards for, God, centuries, probably. These kids need to know they’re not alone. Minnie used to sponsor it, but I’ve taken over now that I’m back.”

Malfoy cleared his throat. “Indeed.” 

Harry barked out a laugh. “Anyway, my identification is a bit of a theoretical issue at this point, since I’m not seeing anyone…” Well, that wasn’t at all relevant to the issue at hand, which was protecting the kids from Malfoy and his pernicious influence. He could be a gay racist. Or a gay wizard fascist. Apparently, he had been a gay wizard fascist as a teen. Still trying to wrap his head around that one, Harry snorted. 

“You’re not with the Weasley girl?” Malfoy’s eyes were on his nails again and he sounded suspiciously casual, given his recent apoplectic outburst. 

Harry laughed again. 

“Ginny and I broke up when I was nineteen. She and Luna got together a couple of months later. We—I mean, me and Ginny—we tried sleeping together and it was just awful. The kissing was fine but then, you know, she’s just more like a sister to me, and it turns out she’s also very, very into women, so it was a bit dry and all, and anyway–” Why was this all coming out to Malfoy, of all people? Even Ron and Hermione didn’t know about the disastrous sex attempt. They didn’t ask. He didn’t tell them. No, it was fine. It was all fine. This was fine. Here he was divulging intimate details to Draco Malfoy. 

Except here was Malfoy, pale and with his arms crossed, wearing an inscrutable expression that made Harry want to slap it off his face. Or slap his own hand over his idiot mouth, which seemed prone to babbling in Malfoy’s presence. And he was supposed to be one, watching Malfoy to make sure Malfoy wasn’t doing anything untoward, and two, getting revenge on Malfoy for one-upping him regarding Shakespeare. Who everyone knew was a Muggle. A very gifted Muggle. But a Muggle nonetheless, and therefore, Harry’s domain. 

Harry stopped, his hands tangled in his own hair. The perfect plan for revenge uncoiled in his mind. 

If Malfoy had been flirting with him, then Malfoy was interested, and if Malfoy was interested, then Malfoy would want to be close to him, and if Malfoy got close to him, then he could figure out Malfoy’s syllabus, and if he knew Malfoy’s syllabus, then he could put Malfoy in this same awkward position of having perfectly planned a lesson and having it blow up in his face with a swift, “Sir, Professor Potter just taught us about the Cold War. Yes, sir, all of it. In great detail and with great nuance about the complicated relationship between the United States and Russia and the proxy wars in the global south.”

Yes, that was it. That was exactly it. 

He paused, and then removed his hands from his hair only to smooth it back again. This also had no great effect. Malfoy’s light eyes followed his hands. He reached for his glasses and took them off—his last hookup had told him his eyes were more luminescent without them—and batted his eyelashes at the Malfoy-colored blob.

“You’re right, Malfoy. I could use some help with the club.” He tried for a sultry tone. “A more worldly role model, one more well-versed in pureblood culture and those nasty little upper-class morals, might be helpful. You could teach them how to buy cufflinks or something.” 

Malfoy cleared his throat. He seemed to be looking away? Harry could guess that it was his profile. His expression was a blur. His entire body was a blur. God, he was going to have to put his glasses back on. 

“Potter, don’t be absurd. Cufflinks should be heirloom.” The cold tone was back. Dammit, not how the plan was supposed to be working. He put his glasses back on to see Malfoy’s face—which was absolutely expressionless. 

“Come to my room later and we can plan some activities.” 

“Potter, that sounds explicit.” Malfoy wouldn’t meet his gaze. 

“Scared, Malfoy?”

“Of course not. I’ll see you at eight this evening.” The flush was back. 

He spun on his heel and stormed out of the classroom. His robes billowed behind him. Should Harry tell him he was becoming a bit Snape-like in his old age? No, no, better to leave that as future ammunition. Well, future ammunition for if this flirting plan failed. 

But it wouldn’t fail. The plan was working. Was it working? Yes, the plan was working. 


	4. The Plan Fails

By seven fifteen, Harry was a sweaty mess. Even though Harry had slipped into the seat next to him, Malfoy had ignored him throughout dinner—a prime window to attempt flirtation—in favor of a lengthy discussion with Bastian about the historical development of Ancient Runes. Harry had considered spilling something onto him in an effort to touch his legs, but decided he’d rather not get hexed in front of the entire school. He had to fend off a stream of criticism from Minerva regarding his lack of correct hat during formal dinners. Malfoy hadn’t been wearing a hat, why didn’t she get on his back about it too? Harry had buried his nose in his Yorkshire pudding and nodded a lot. He couldn’t shove Malfoy under the bus though, if he was continuing with this flirtation gimmick. 

And now Malfoy was coming to his room and he hadn’t decided upon a single move that would reveal Malfoy’s innermost thoughts—well, just the ones regarding his syllabus and lesson planning for the rest of term—without Harry having to go too far and actually having to kiss him or something even more odious. 

He tore off a piece of parchment and sat at his desk. 

_Dear R + H, Malfoy stole my lesson for today and has completely ruined my next couple of weeks, and I’ve got to spend the weekend putting together costumes now, and also it turns out that Malfoy is very gay so I am planning on flirting with him through the guise of getting his help with the club and getting closer to him so I can figure out his syllabus and completely ruin each and every lesson for the rest of the term. Yes, this is petty, but Malfoy might also be up to something nefarious and it is better to be close to one’s enemies, etc. He might be teaching them blood purist nonsense in History of Magic. He always was a slimy git. I will find out. x x x HJP_

He folded the parchment and dropped some sealing wax on it. He chirped to Ulula, his large tawny owl, who flapped her wings expectantly and hopped across to the desk. He’d chosen her specifically because her chattiness was so different than Hedwig’s stately and arch demeanor.

“Go on, girl, go to Hermione and Ron’s.” Ulula blinked, pushed her head under his hand, and left after she’d been given a few scratches. 

Suddenly, Harry realized that he stank, like, well and truly reeked. God, he should have taken a bath earlier. Malfoy was sure to turn his nose up at any Potter-related stench. He could try the new cologne Cho had sent him last Christmas. Come to think of it, he rather suspected that it was a re-gift from Theodore’s unwanted Christmas presents. He always sent them a nice box of Honeydukes. But the heavy cut glass chamber contained something that seemed to change scents every time he opened it. Hopefully it wouldn’t be too bad this time.

Fifteen minutes was a bit tight, but he could manage it. Slipping his trainers off and leaving the rest of his clothes in a pile on the floor, he hopped to the bathroom (the stones were so cold; he should ask Kreacher if there was a spare rug somewhere, though Kreacher was just as likely to have removed the rug just to watch Harry suffer a bit; Kreacher pretended to hate both Harry and Hogwarts, but Harry caught him humming occasionally and he was a fierce member of the Elf Union) and settled into the tub before turning the taps. He knew it was odd, but he loved being in the bath while it filled. It was just a reminder that he could luxuriate in the bath for as long as he wanted, free from the grimy feeling of Dudley’s cold bathwater. Feeling rather chipper, he began humming and conjured soft silvery bubbles. He splashed happily about and belted out the few words he remembered from that catchy James Blunt song—“You’re beautiful, it’s true—”as he got up, shaking a bit like a dog to get the water off. 

“I saw your face in a crowded place,” he stretched out the last word as he reached for his towel, hummed the words he forgot, “there must be an angel with a smile on her face—” he wrapped the towel around his hips, put his glasses back on, and opened the door—“when she thought up that I should be with—”

Malfoy was in his armchair.

Shit, Malfoy was in his armchair. 

Shit, Malfoy was in his armchair and Harry was wearing a towel.

Malfoy’s eyes flicked over his body and then firmly settled on the floor. 

The towel was small. The towel was very small. 

Malfoy cleared his throat and fixed his cuffs. He wasn’t wearing his black robes, just a white Oxford without a tie and charcoal grey trousers.

“Your door was open.” 

Wait, wait, Harry could totally spin this. Sure, he wasn’t jacked by any means, but Hogwarts wasn’t exactly bursting with potential dating opportunities or men under fifty with at least one abdominal muscle, so he could work with this. And, as he’d reviewed before, he got laid. Whenever he wanted. Yeah. He could work this.

“I must have, uh,” Harry leaned against the bathroom door frame, “gotten distracted in the bath.” Was that insinuating enough? It was rather drafty standing like this. Should he put one arm up the frame? Maybe that was too much like a lothario. 

There was a strange noise from the now rather pinkish Malfoy, who seemed to have his gaze fixed firmly on Harry’s feet. 

This pose was probably good enough, then. 

Harry ran one hand through his wet hair and shook his head a bit. He was going for a “Muggle perfume ad of a dude getting out of a pool” look. But shit, that guy never had glasses. Now his glasses were spattered with water and he couldn’t really see and his wand was still in the bathroom. Placing one hand firmly on the towel, he walked across the room and bent to his dresser. 

The silence was deafening. Harry pulled a bit too hard on the bottom drawer and it crashed onto his foot. 

“Oh, fuck!” he yelped, and grabbed his toe. 

Somewhat unfortunately, he chose to use the hand that had been holding the towel, and things got drafty. 

There was a yelp from the armchair. “Potter!”

Harry wanted the floor to swallow him up. This was completely out of hand and now he was flashing his bare arse at a colleague and he still didn’t have one more iota of information regarding Malfoy’s syllabus, so this was really all quite a waste. This was not according to the Plan. As he bent down to the towel, he realized it was already wrapping itself back around his waist. 

In a gruff tone, he managed to thank Malfoy. He grabbed boxers, jeans, and a t-shirt, hurried back to the bathroom to get dressed and get his flush under control. Transfiguring one of his shoes into a hard, wooden chair, he dragged it over to face the armchair and threw himself down. 

Malfoy’s ears were still pink. Harry could see that the flush spread across his collarbones. Grossly protruding. He could button his shirt up a bit more. What was he, a lothario. 

“So, Potter,” Malfoy said, a bit twattishly, “let’s discuss this club of yours.” 

All Harry could do was nod, which Malfoy took as permission to espouse a long-winded narrative about his experiences and opinions. 

It turned out that Malfoy had spent five years traveling the world and spending time with wizarding enclaves, many of which were much more open to more sexualities than wizarding Britain acknowledged. The long independence of Japan from the bigotry of Christian and wizarding missionaries allowed a flourishing of same-sex relationships, while entire villages of Kenyan witches shunned men. Malfoy’s eyes shone as he explained the intricate courtship rituals of northern Europe, the yogic wizards of Mumbai, and the community of Animagi in rural Idaho who embraced wizarding children who’d been disowned for showing “abnormal” traits.

His sleeves rode up as he gestured, revealing tendrils of dark ink that blossomed across his pale wrists. A tattooed Malfoy, Harry mused. Dark Mark on the left, Harry suspected, but it had never been confirmed, and besides, what was on the right?

“And, furthermore, Potter, the name of the club is hideous—what does this WAF—” Malfoy made a strangled sound and gestured at the air—“stand for?”

“It’s W, A, W, F, A, N, B, M, L, G, T, Q, A, Q, B, I, A, A, A, A, A, A, O, F, W, S, E, M, W—it’s short for Witches and Wizards and Non-Binary Mages, Lesbian, Gay, Transgender, Queer and Questioning, Bisexual, Intersex, Aromantic, Asexual, Allies and Any Other Folks Who Support Equality in the Magical World.” Harry breathed out. 

“How do you even remember that?”

_I spent hours memorizing it when Hermione and I came up with it eight years ago_, Harry thought, and shrugged. “It’s not that complicated.”

“It’s absurd.”

“I wanted to be inclusive!”

“It’s like Granger’s spewing initiative; absolutely disgusting and not at all catchy.”

Harry blew out of his nostrils. “One, that was S.P.E.W., two, it’s now an international organization that coordinates elf demands and strikes, and three, the name of my club is perfectly fine, and most of the kids just say ‘waw-fan,’ so, it’s fine. It doesn’t need to be marketable. It’s a Hogwarts club.”

“Potter, do you think the Slug Club is a name that would succeed in the real world? No, but at least it has panache. It’s the assonance.”

“If I remember correctly, Malfoy, you weren’t even a member of the Slug Club.” 

Malfoy pursed his lips. “Slughorn had a problem with my father, not with me.”

Harry clenched his fists, his blood running cold. How dare Malfoy deny his own past? His own family? 

Taking a shot in the dark (well, more of a viciously educated guess) Harry said tightly: “You were a Death Eater, too.”

Malfoy startled back as though he had been shocked. 

A silence stretched between them. 

No syllabus was worth denying the truth, Harry reminded himself, digging his nails into his palms. The flirting plan was definitely off the table now. If Malfoy couldn’t even come to terms with his own blood purist, terrorist past, he didn’t deserve a place around kids. Especially not kids who needed support and love. And role models. 

“You know why I disappeared after the war?” Malfoy’s eyes were fixed on his knees.

Harry shook his head. “Had to spend that inheritance somehow?” 

Malfoy’s gaze pierced Harry.

“I was in exile.” Without his eyes leaving Harry’s, he continued in a toneless voice. “I did everything my father wanted. Everything.”

Malfoy slid the cufflink out of his left sleeve. He folded the crisp white fabric neatly and rotated his hand, laying his forearm bare. The Mark was blackish-blue. 

“I took the Mark for him.”

Harry leaned closer. His stomach turned. Before he could stop himself, he was running his fingers across where the snake coiled out of the skull’s eyes—the gentle bumps of the bleeding ink were almost unnoticeable beside the jagged white lines of scar tissue.

“Did you—”

“Try to cut it off?” Malfoy’s lips quirked. “No, Potter, I was trying to die.”

He didn’t move his arm. Harry couldn’t move his hand away. Malfoy’s skin was so pale, almost translucent. The Mark didn’t move. He could remember a time when touching the Mark would have pierced his skull with pain. But it didn’t have power anymore. They lost. He’d won. He was free, but the past kept reaching out and dragging itself into his life. 

“My father found me and Theo Nott when I was fifteen. It was—” Malfoy shrugged his shoulders gently—“unforgiveable, apparently. The last of the Malfoys, a disgusting fag. My mother had to Crucio him to get him to stop beating me. She hid his wand for weeks. She convinced Voldemort that I was more use alive. That they could use me to get to you.” 

He paused. “I would have done anything to get my father to look at me without hatred.”

Harry closed his hand over Malfoy’s wrist. His mouth was dry. This was so much worse than he’d imagined. 

Malfoy stared down at his arm and Harry’s hand. “It doesn’t excuse this. I should have known it was wrong. Why I did it doesn’t excuse any of it. I don’t expect you to forgive or pity me.” 

Harry’s mind was buzzing with a soft static. Words seemed impossible. This pain was nothing like the sharp Horcrux pain. This was more like suffocating. White feathers filled his mouth. 

“I was an idiot. Nothing was ever enough. Nothing would ever be enough to erase who I was—who I am.” Malfoy cleared his throat. 

In the same modulated tone, he continued: “I was a shitty kid, I know that. I honestly thought I was better than everyone else. I teased people mercilessly. Neville, the Creevey boys, Ron, Hermione. I believed it then, that the Malfoys and purebloods were superior. But then my father started weaponizing his approval and I knew it was wrong. I knew those views were not only incoherent but also evil, but I couldn’t stop. If I would just do one more thing for the Dark Lord, if I could just—

“I stomped on your face. I tried to kill Dumbledore. I betrayed Hogwarts. I murdered a Squib, I tortured fellow Hogwarts students. I mean, I was a fucking bad person. A life term in Azkaban would have been generous. I should have been Kissed. My father was sure that cooperating with the Wizengamot would decrease his own punishment. I think he was pleased to reveal my transgressions. Not that I was gay, of course. That wasn’t about to become public knowledge. Preserve the Malfoy honor and all that. He thought if he told the Wizengamot everything I did, he wouldn’t get Kissed.”

Harry was still clutching Malfoy’s pale arm. He couldn’t breathe. This was so awful. His parents had died trying to protect him. Malfoy’s dad had tried to kill his own son, just because he liked men. 

“It didn’t work. They gave him the Kiss anyway. They were going to send me to Azkaban, but my mother still had some pull in the Ministry.” He let out a broken laugh. “They exiled my mother and I for five years. I still don’t know what she did, not really, to get that outcome. I doubt it was strictly legal.” Malfoy was staring down at their limbs. 

“I did a lot of bad things, Potter. I fucked up. I blamed him for a long time. But it was my choice. I could have chosen differently—I could have—but I wanted—"

Harry found his voice. “Love shouldn’t be conditional.”

“Oh, Potter,” Malfoy said in a soft voice, “but it so often is.”

With gentle fingers, he prised Harry’s hand off his arm and returned it to Harry’s lap. He rolled his sleeve back down and slipped the cufflink in. He straightened in the armchair and cleared his throat. 

“I’ve tried to atone but know it will never be enough. If you don’t think I’d be a positive influence on the students, I accept that.”

Harry’s mind had gone blank again, but this time, it was from too many thoughts rushing through his head, crowding his mind with aggravated and buzzing black words in a catastrophic maelstrom. 

Malfoy didn’t seem to expect an answer but rose and nodded to Harry and shut the door gently after himself. 

His wooden chair let out a whoosh of pink smoke and transformed back into a shoe, dumping Harry on the ground. He collapsed backwards and lay for a long time staring at the dark, broad beams of the ceiling.


	5. Halloween

The next three weeks were terrible. Harry spent that first weekend sewing historically accurate Elizabethan era costumes for his fifth-year class and mulling over how Malfoy’s history had just spilled out of him. It was inexcusable. Malfoy had killed a Squib. Malfoy had broken Harry’s nose on the Hogwarts Express. Malfoy had yelled blood purist shit at Hermione. Malfoy had tried to kill Dumbledore. Not that Dumbledore had always acted to protect Harry—no, Dumbledore had raised him to be a sacrificial lamb—something Harry had spent months working through with his therapist—but the thought stuck in his throat until he shook his head. He didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t forgive Malfoy, but it seemed just as fucked up to hate him for actions he now regretted, and he couldn’t continue with the Flirting Plan. He sent a quick note to Ron and Hermione (_R & H, Malfoy definitely not still a blood purist. Still a git. x HJP) _and received a terse reply from Ron (_SERIOUSLY MATE LEAVE IT_) and a lengthy response from Hermione (_Harry, as we discussed after your therapy breakthrough this past April, it is important to remember that what we did as teenagers may define us to the rest of the world, but they do not define us to us. Obsessing about Malfoy, who undoubtedly once was a blood purist and git and idiot who thoroughly deserved the slap I once delivered and probably more besides, may not be the best use of your attention in the coming months, given that this is your first year teaching as a Hogwarts professor; your time is more valuable than that …_) that did little to settle the welter of conflicting emotions in Harry’s mind. 

That Monday, he didn’t know what to say and avoided Malfoy’s eyes throughout each meal. Malfoy didn’t reach out. He’d would sit as far from Harry as possible at meals. 

Their lesson plans didn’t overlap anymore. Britney and Elspeth reported to Harry that Professor Malfoy had apologized to the fifth-years for causing them to repeat material in Professor Potter’s class (git, he stole it!) and vowed to include less culture in his upcoming lectures. Elspeth rolled her eyes, but all Britney said was, “I don’t see why you two won’t just coordinate the cultural stuff,” to which Harry grunted. 

At faculty meetings, Malfoy would linger near the tea cart and fuss with his cup (even though he took his tea black) or delay choosing his biscuit (even though he always settled on a lemon cream or lemon-ginger biscuit) until Harry had taken a seat, and then choose the one farthest from Harry. That was fine. If Malfoy regretted sharing his murderous and bigoted past—even if it was fueled by a misguided desire to win his asshole father’s love—and chose to freeze Harry out, that was fine. Addie Murton and Bastian Khan seemed to have taken some kind of intrahouse-fueled sympathy on Malfoy and formed a buffer between Malfoy and Harry, always patting Malfoy’s arm or whispering asides during meetings. At the meetings, Malfoy rarely spoke, just spent them scratching away in a huge bound volume (suspicious). 

Padma raised her eyebrows at the entire situation; Harry didn’t want to tell her Draco’s secrets and told her they’d had a disagreement regarding the name of WAWFAN. He wouldn’t tell her anything else, and she stopped prying after Harry was ranting about Malfoy and waved his wand too emphatically and half the beakers in her classroom shattered. He did feel bad about that, even if he had a strong Reparo. 

He didn’t invite Malfoy to the WAWFAN meetings. Malfoy would have to talk to him first. He’d have to show he’d changed. Harry couldn’t reach out. Malfoy had to be the one to cave. 

Hermione and Ron visited and took him out for drinks at the Three Broomsticks, where Hannah Abbott, who’d bought the pub from Madam Rosmerta a few years back, served them crisp cider and piping hot chips and let them in on the Hogsmeade gossip. The men who owned the pet store wandered in and ordered their usuals, then fell into conversation with Hannah, and when Harry found out they’d been married for almost fifteen years, he invited them to the next WAWFAN meeting. Ben, despite choking on his glass of white wine, agreed, and Barnaby nodded happily, clapping his huge silver-ringed hands together in a jangly excitement. The meeting was a huge success, probably because Barnaby brought five Puffskeins, but Harry vowed to invite more community members, if only to show the students there was a world of happiness outside Hogwarts. (And that there were older gays, even if the _Daily Prophet_ continued to plaster euphemisms and hatred across its pages.)

There was a bank holiday at Teddy’s Muggle elementary school, and Andromeda brought him up to Hogwarts. His hair and skin flickered between their usual curly teal locks and freckles and an approximation of Harry’s messy black hair and copper skin the entire time, and Harry could barely look at the rippling colors and textures. Malfoy, who seemed to know Teddy, had looked at him sternly while serving him a slice of quiche and told him to choose one unless he wanted the headmaster to lose her lunch. Teddy settled on miniature Potter, and Harry glowed. Teddy had screamed himself hoarse at the Gryffindor-Hufflepuff pre-season scrimmage and had to be taken to the Hospital Wing for a honey throat potion from Patrick Hardbroom, who, high off Hufflepuff’s win, ignored Harry’s dour expression and slipped Teddy a cheering potion rather than the sedating one Harry had requested in an undertone, and spent an hour teaching the young boy Hufflepuff cheers in his strong Irish accent until Patrick thought his voice was back to normal. Harry rolled his eyes and settled in for a quick kip on a bed. Teddy slipped his aspiration to be a “Puff, just like my mum” into each conversation they had the rest of the day. When Andromeda Flooed into Harry’s quarters that evening, Teddy was collapsed in Harry’s armchair, a smear of chocolate across his mouth, while Harry was snoring over a copy of Martin Miggs. She woke Harry up by kissing him on the head, and he covered the swell in his throat with a cough. 

Then it was Halloween. Since Harry’s schooldays, the Halloween feast had taken on a more mischievous quality as students attempted to prank their professors and the ghosts (a futile enterprise, since they were incorporeal and generally ignored the students) and neck in about every dark alcove. Nearly-Headless Nick floated into through Harry’s desk during his second-year class on the varieties of Muggle currency and invited Harry to his Death Day party in a drone that was barely audible over the chaos his sudden appearance caused.

He couldn’t attend Nick’s party, as he told the ghost, because the professors paired up and had to patrol the halls. He didn’t mention in front of the pre-adolescents that this was to prevent any Hogwarts babies or too much exhibitionism—he didn’t want to inspire the twelve-year-olds to attempt some largely premature experimentation. 

Minerva seemed to welcome this new tradition with a twinkle in her eye. “It reminds me of the Weasley twins,” she confided in Harry a few hours before the feast, “Keeps me young.” She twirled her wand and transfigured a knight’s sword into a pumpkin. The knight clanked ominously and then quelled under her sharp gaze. 

“Coffee at dinner, Potter,” she said with a finger waggle and set off towards her office, spinning garlands of bats and cobwebs along the hallway as she went. “Don’t forget your costume!”

The knight held out the pumpkin with a plaintive helmet tilt.

“Nah, mate, can’t help you,” Harry muttered. He had three hours to whip up a Halloween costume—he’d promised five house points to the student who first guessed what he was—but that required some kind of witty and Muggle-related fancy dress.

Adjusting a red pointed hat and a long grey beard, Harry shuffled into the Great Hall. He hadn’t put much thought into the movement potential of the greyish-brown orb that surrounded his body. His knees banged against the transfigured cardboard with each step. Maybe Addie or Filius would have an idea of how to make it a bit more flexible. 

“Professor Potter!” a small first year shrieked at him, her straight black pigtails pulled into two tight French braids. “I’m Dorothy! From the Muggle book we read! Mum sent me the dress!” She twirled in her blue-and-white checked dress.

“Don’t forget to click your heels after the feast, Helga, and it’ll take you right home,” he said with a smile and a subtle flick of his wand that would transport her back to the Slytherin dorms when she tapped her ruby slippers together. Helga’s parents had tried to get her out of Muggle Studies before the term began, but her effusive letters—and Harry’s weekly packets of her Outstanding class assignments—had apparently done their work to decrease their blood purist bigotry, at least a little.

He continued bumping his way towards the high table, nodding and exchanging comments with students on the way. No one guessed correctly. 

Wait, was he late? All the seats were filled. Well, except for the one between Hagrid, who had gone for some kind of serial killer clown (or perhaps just an ordinary and untidy clown, given the lipstick slash around his mouth), and Draco, who seemed to be glowing. But he couldn’t sit there. Certainly not next to a luminous Draco Malfoy. A quick glance at Minerva, whose lifelike cat nose twitched, and Mrs. Hardbroom, who giggled uncontrollably into her butterbeer, let him know that they’d all been there boozing it up for at least fifteen minutes and that this was a set-up. Hooch and Pomfrey were visiting, he noticed, dressed as bacon and an egg, which would be disgustingly adorable on anyone but two elderly women who had been secretly married for the past forty years and openly married for the past five. Good to have extra hands on deck, he thought, and bumbled his way over to the sole remaining seat. 

“How’re ye supposed to sit in that, Harry?” Hagrid boomed out. “What are you? A dirty Quaffle?”

Malfoy glanced back quickly and muttered something under his breath.

“Yes, Professor Malfoy?” Harry said sharply.

“A dwarf planet, Potter? How creative.” 

“Pluto was demoted this August.” Harry said, and continued to stand behind his chair, irritated that Malfoy had guessed before any of his students. Suddenly there was a glowing seam along one side of the orb, and it swung open to release Harry. Good thing he’d worn clothes under it, he thought, and nodded his thanks at Filius, who looked confused. He slid into his chair.

“My costume is pertinent to my field of teaching. Unlike whatever this is,” he said, waving his hand at the glowing Malfoy next to him. Malfoy’s white-blonde hair was slicked back and glistened softly in the candlelight. His cheekbones sparkled, and his long white robe was so low cut (really, thought Harry, they were at a school), that Harry could see the delicate blue veins that spread across his chest. Even his collarbones glimmered with a gentle blue effervescence. But it wasn’t just makeup, Harry realized, as he looked down at Malfoy’s hand curled around the goblet. A few centimeters of the air all around him glowed with a soft grey light. 

“I’m the moon,” Malfoy said with a shrug. Harry blinked at the sudden burst of light. “My third-years just did the wizard Galileo and how he was sentenced to death by the Pope for his heliocentric views. So the Moon is relevant to my course.” He eyed Harry over his goblet, took a long swig, and then darted his tongue out to lick the rim.

Harry grabbed his own goblet and downed it. Damn, pumpkin juice. He needed something stronger.

Malfoy looked up at him from underneath sparkling eyelashes, then flicked his gaze back to the table and floated a tankard of spiked butterbeer towards Harry. 

“Well, as long as you’re not ragging on Muggle society,” he managed after swallowing a mouthful of the sugary and alcoholic fizz. 

“The papacy is an outdated institution and has been since the seventh century.” Malfoy calmly broke a piece of bread and buttered half before popping it into his mouth. 

Harry coughed on his next sip and dribbled some butterbeer down his front. 

Malfoy raised an eyebrow.

“I’m not stupid, Potter. I’m an historian of early modern and modern European magical and Muggle history. I published an article on Galileo’s trial last year in _Early Modern Wizarding History._” Malfoy shook his head and exhaled through his nose. “Not that you read _EMWH_.” Harry didn’t know anything about medieval popes or whatever journal Malfoy had just name-dropped. Muggle Studies was a fairly modern discipline and not even his—wait—

“An historian, Christ, Malfoy, who are you, a latter-day Oscar Wilde or some seventeenth-century dandy?”

Malfoy pursed his lips. “‘An’ is the correct article, Potter.” He raised his eyebrows and shrugged. “And I always thought it would be great fun to be a dandy, between the powdered wigs, silk waistcoats, and the rotten teeth and gout. Of course, you’d know all about this, given how the latter two weren’t understood by Muggles until well into the twentieth century.” 

Hagrid boomed out a laugh on Harry’s other side. 

“He’s got you there, ‘Arry, he knows his stuff.” Hagrid passed a plate of Cornish pasties to Harry and nodded with a grin. Harry poked the pasty on his plate and discovered that it seemed to be steak … and pumpkin? How thematic. 

The rest of the feast passed in a blur. Malfoy was glowing, and Harry kept cooling his face by drinking copious amounts of butterbeer. Malfoy’s glimmering spellwork must be heat-radiating, he reasoned, downing his fourth? fifth? tankard. He fell back into his typical snarky exchanges with Malfoy and the reasons Harry had been avoiding him receded further and further into the distance. Malfoy kept pushing the bread basket towards him. 

Down the table, Addie, who had transfigured her braids into garden snakes and wore a golden toga, kept hitting Padma’s shoulder as Padma gesticulated wildly and tipped over a gravy boat with one long medieval sleeve. Mrs. Hardbroom giggled into the tureen of potatoes while her husband, who seemed to have gone for some kind of Muggle rapper-inspired look with giant gold chains and a jersey, kept shushing her loudly while holding in his laughter and slowly turning crimson. Minerva, Filius, Pomona, and Bastian had fallen into a serious conversation in which each of them would only respond to their own points and completely ignore the others’ pontificating. Hagrid’s laughter boomed out across the Great Hall, causing a nearby Ravenclaw to jump in his seat.

Harry had no idea how much time had passed. He was hot and his palms wouldn’t stop sweating. Wiping them once again on his faded black jeans, his fingers bumped against Malfoy’s leg. Malfoy shot up as though he’d been shocked. _His robes were soft, _Harry thought belatedly.

“Oh, sorry, Malfoy,” he said. “Didn’t see you glowing there.” 

Harry was saved from any further conversation by the sudden explosion of a pumpkin near the Slytherin table. It released crimson canaries that flew around shitting flames and dive-bombing students. McGonagall snapped out of her soliloquy and shot a jet of water across the entire Hall. Students and professors alike gaped. 

Magnifying her voice, she boomed across the hall, “All students to their common rooms now. Anyone found in the corridors after the next ten minutes will lose their house one hundred points.” Noises of shock and horror—and a few shrieks from canary victims—broke out across all four tables at this draconian threat. One hundred points. Harry hadn’t lost points on that scale since Snape’s reign of terror in the potions classroom. 

Addie leapt to her feet and attempted to transfigure the canaries into paper planes, but they seemed to retain a malicious capacity and drove the students from the hall. Padma couldn’t stop giggling and slapping her knee (which Harry had never, ever seen her do). 

McGonagall shook her head and let out a high-pitched giggle. 

“Addie, come now, surely you can do better,” she said and struck a casting pose. “On the count of three—”

A jet of blue light shot out of Addie’s wand, lassoed the papery canaries, and flattened them into a stack of reddish paper. 

“Three, I said! Not a fair contest!” McGonagall straightened her pointed hat. 

Addie dissolved into giggles and crashed into Padma’s chair. 

Filius clapped his hands and cups of steaming coffee appeared. Malfoy fell upon his and downed it in two gulps. Harry could barely stomach the thought of a hot drink. His face was going to slide right off.

“Right, so we’ll pair off and patrol the halls—” there was a general shuffling and Harry, who had drifted away for a moment, found that he and Draco were the only ones still seated. Wait, did that mean he and Malfoy were going to be partners? He refused to meet Harry’s eyes and toyed with the handle of his coffee cup. 

“And that just leaves Rubeus and Pomona to the third-floor corridor and Harry and Padma get the dungeons.”

Padma rolled her eyes at Harry and handed him a pumpkin juice. “Drink up, sweetheart. The dungeons are going to be popping if it’s anything like last year. They think they can get into my Amortentia.” Addie giggled at the last word and Padma shrugged. “They’re all idiots who want to find true love. As if anyone knows who they’re meant to be with when they’re fourteen.” 

Harry stared at the juice and blinked. “I think we know who we want to be with at fourteen, but it’s usually not the same person you want to be with when you’re nineteen. Or twenty-six.”

Padma rolled her eyes at him. “That’s literally exactly what I was saying. The person you’re into at fourteen isn’t destined to be your soulmate.”

“I don’t know,” Audrey’s melodious voice broke in. “Talbott and I went on our first date when we were fourteen. Madame Puddifoot’s, even. It was so awkward, but we’ve been together ever since.”

Hagrid guffawed, “I remember that! You thought asking Talbott out would break Barnaby’s heart!” 

“Wait,” Harry said, “Barnaby like Barnaby Lee? The one who owns the pet store in Hogsmeade?”

Audrey nodded. “Poor boy. He ate so much ice cream in the next week that the elves begged me to cheer him up. They were so tired of making butterscotch and hundreds and thousands and sour worms and marshmallow creme.” She shook her head, dislodging a piece of lavender. “He’s always had an abominable sweet tooth. The elves don’t like to deny anyone anything, but it was too much for even them.”

Harry clutched his pumpkin juice. “But he’s married to Ben! They said they got together in London! I didn’t know they went here!” 

Hagrid, Audrey, Addie, and Padma all looked at him as though he were an idiot. 

“The Lees have attended this school since 1374,” Addie said. “And every last one of them has been a Slytherin.”

Audrey paused while prodding a sunflower into her messy bun with her wand and said in a dreamy voice, “Ben always had chocolate frogs, just in case we ran into a Dementor.” She shook her head (the sunflower didn’t budge) and continued, “They didn’t really find each other until after Hogwarts, but a lot of people do fall in love as teenagers. Don’t be too harsh with them tonight, Padma!” 

Padma smiled. “I’ll try to be kind, Audrey.”

“But if you see Claude, take at least twenty points! He’s trouble, that one. Just like his dad. Absolutely no regard for the rules.” Giggling to herself, she wandered away, gathering Filius in her wake of trailing yellow robes. Once again, Harry wondered how someone who was more on the Lovegood end of the dreamy-to-sensible spectrum could teach DADA. 

Harry chortled and then was brought up short by a thought. “Wait, isn’t her husband the Head Auror?”

“Aye,” Hagrid said with a smile. “Damn fine man. Knows right from wrong. And that’s not always the rules. Or the law. You know that.” He loped off after Audrey and said something that made her shake with laughter. 

Harry gulped the dregs of the pumpkin juice to avoid staring at how Addie’s hand lingered on Padma’s arm. They were whispering to each other about. Love, love, love. Ugh. 

And Claude Oliver-Winger. Harry was too drunk to deal with a violet-eyed, grey-haired twelve-year-old who didn’t believe in inside voices, could recite every Hogwarts rule back to front so he could defy the spirit but not the letter, and knew more secret passageways than anyone without the Marauders’ Map. Oliver-Winger was a handful. And there were three more, he’d heard. Something to look forward to in the coming years.

Harry placed the goblet carefully back on the table.

But then it was on the floor. Harry blinked. He was sure—

Then it was on the table again.

Malfoy swished away with a flutter of glitter.

The dungeons were fairly quiet, just a few giggling couples shooed off towards their dorms by a fatigued Padma, who, thirty minutes into patrol, was rummaging through her classroom drawers for a sobering potion. Harry drank half and felt his senses sharpening.

“No one’s gotten into the Amortentia yet.” Padma grinned. “Probably because I labeled it ‘Bubotuber Pus Poison.’” 

Rubbing his forehead, Harry groaned. “Why does anyone bother with Amortentia anyway? It’s Halloween, it’s not Valentine’s Day.”

Padma wrinkled her nose. “Honestly, Potter, you’re the worst desi wizard ever. Who raised you?”

“My mum’s abusive white family,” he said with a flippant grin. 

Her face went serious. “Harry.” 

“No, no, let’s not talk about that now.” He waved the issue aside with his hands.

“Ok, well, you know how Diwali is usually in late October or early December? When wizarding families emigrated from India to Britain, they wove the magic that built up during Diwali into the pagan rituals of Halloween. Weeks of celebration strengthened the diasporic magical communities that were reeling from violent upheaval and the racial tensions they faced in Britain. One of the big nineteenth-century British traditions was scrying for your future spouse in cauldrons of water or with apples, which was madly popular among the desi crowd. So, like, between finding out the identity of your true love and the fact that candlelight is universally flattering, it’s a pretty romantic holiday.”

Harry scrunched his face. “I’ve never done Diwali.”

“What the fuck, Potter?” she said, scowling at him. “I would have done it this year for you.” 

“What?”

Padma sighed. “I’m not really into that kind of lamp ritual, but I’d have done it with you if I’d known you’d never done it. Parvati’s always inviting me down to London to celebrate with her and Lavender. They’re so grossly in love it’s stupid and they always try to divine shit about my love life from my leftover chai.”

“I mean, if they came to Hogwarts, they’d know immediately who you fancy.”

Padma blushed and covered her face.

“Oh my god, is it that obvious?”

Harry snorted. 

“Addie’s so into you.”

“What? No, don’t be stupid.”

“Mate, I’m not that stupid. I saw you two whispering after dinner. She was all—” Harry learned forward and stroked Padma’s arm. She squealed in a very un-Padma-like octave and bopped him on the head. 

“You’re absurd, Potter.” 

“Not that absurd, Patil. Ask her out? Even to just make Parvati shut up?”

“She’s my coworker! And my parents think Parvati and Lavender are roommates.” She ran her nail along a seam in her robes. “I don’t think I could do that, like, keep a big secret like that.”

Harry considered her bowed head. “You don’t know until you try it. I mean, I don’t know your parents, other than that they’re madly protective, but they probably just want what’s best for you two. They let you both come back for the battle.”

“Even more. They came to fight too.” Padma’s voice cracked. “Mum said blood purity was ridiculous. ‘Trust me,’ she said, ‘this is nonsense.’”

She swallowed and said, “You know, they only talk to each other in English. She yells at us in Hindi, but my dad’s family speaks mostly Marathi. They met in English class at uni. My dad brought her snacks every day until she said she’d go on a date with him. She always told us make a man work for you. I mean, turns out neither of us wanted a man, but—"

Padma shrugged and continued: “She got a job doing translations for British wizards in India. One of them took a shine to her and hired her for a translation job at the Wizengamot. I guess my dad ran up to her and grabbed her hand just as the international Portkey went off. And then he didn’t have any documents, so they got married as soon as they landed in London. Like, they were already engaged, but. You know.”

“Fucking love, dude.” Harry cracked his knuckles. “That’s what saved me. My mum, she loved me so much, Voldemort’s Avada Kedavra couldn’t hit me. That’s what the scar’s from,” he said, pushing his hair up. 

“That’s true?” Padma leaned forward and traced her fingers across his forehead.

“Yeah.”

“I just thought it was a myth. Like a romantic reason to fight Voldemort. Love prevails and all that.”

Harry shook his head to let his hair fall across the scar again. “It’s the truth. I still don’t get it, but it’s true.”

“I can’t imagine you without it,” Padma said. “It suits you. So does the eyebrow piercing.”

Harry laughed. “Yeah, I was trying to distract from this huge-ass facial scar. Or balance it out, I don’t know. Give the people something else to talk about.”

Padma patted his knee. “You give them plenty to talk about, Potter. Proud of you, kid.”

“Padma, we’re the same age.”

“Yeah, but you’re out there fighting against blood supremacy and racism and homophobia and I’m like, scared to tell my parents I like girls and I teach at my old college.”

“I’m also teaching at my old college,” Harry said with a laugh. “We’re both lame; it’s fine.”

“At least I’m still not sparring with my teenage nemesis,” Padma snarked. The coziness of the last half-hour must have been grating on her. And she noticed too damn much. She reached back and massaged her head while fixing him with a piercing gaze. 

“What? I don’t fight with Malfoy.”

“Yeah, the icy silence and all the drinking isn’t because of Malfoy. Not at all. Completely unrelated.” She waved her wand emphatically. “You’re completely fine at faculty meetings, entirely chummy, work together on related curriculum, all that shit. You’re absolute mates.”

Harry scoffed. “He’s the one who doesn’t talk to me.”

Padma hummed.

“He invited himself to be a part of WAWFAN, but we had this really intense discussion and he’s been avoiding me ever since. I fail to see how that is still,” he held up his fingers in air-quotes, “‘sparring with my teenage nemesis.’”

“Intense discussion about what?”

Harry’s neck prickled. “I can’t tell you. It’s private.”

“Oh,” Padma said in a casual tone. “Was it that he proved his loyalty to the Death Eaters after failing to murder Dumbledore by killing Greg Goyle’s suicidal one-hundred-and-ninety-four-year-old Squib grandfather who’d been abandoned by the rest of the family after his witch wife died? Or was it how he used his inheritance to establish an anti-war charity named after the Creevey brothers?” Padma paused and narrowed her eyes at him. “Don’t tell anyone else that. I accidentally opened one of his owls. The man who runs the charity has atrocious handwriting.” 

She stared down at Harry and continued: “Was it that his dissertation was on anti-fascist movements in Muggle and Wizarding modern history? That that dissertation’s been published as a best-selling book in five languages? That the introduction to that book made me cry because he writes so heartbreakingly about how he thought if he could just conform to his family’s fascist ideology, they’d love and accept him even though he’s gay? When he thought you’d died and—” she broke off and pressed her hands together, touched them to her lips, and then pointed at him. “Harry, you have to read it.”

Harry was stunned into silence. His mind was doing the fuzzy thing again, and he felt the edges of a headache curling up inside his skull. 

“He’s changed,” she said. 

He picked at the ripped knee of his jeans. “I don’t know. Anyone can write shit and not mean it.”

“Look,” she said with a sigh, “Just give him a chance. A little one. You sat next to him today at dinner and nothing exploded.” She smirked. “You did have to drink about a liter of butterbeer, but—”

“His spell was emitting heat! That’s not my fault!”

“Right, anyway, just make him a cup of tea at the next faculty meeting. I’m sure you know how he takes it.”

“What?!”

“I’ve seen you watching him.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “I don’t watch him. That’s bonkers.” Padma snorted. “Ok, no, you know what, fine, I watch everyone. It’s not just him. My past fuels paranoia. C’mon, Padma.”

“Ok, so I take my tea…”

“… two sugars?”

Padma sighed, muttered “milky,” and pinched the bridge of her nose. 

“And Malfoy takes his tea …”

“Black.” That answer came out far too fast. 

“And he likes which biscuits?”

Harry sighed. “Lemon creme. Or lemon-ginger. And he only takes one. Whatever, you’re right, blah blah blah.” Resuming his seam-unraveling, he grumbled, “It’s only because he could be dangerous. Like, he could be poisoning the milk or something. He still lurks about. Lurkingly.”

Padma shook her head. “Ok, whatever you have to think, but, seriously, Harry. Give him a chance at faculty meetings or with WAWFAN or in the Great Hall. You don’t have to like him, ok? Just let him try.”

“Ok, whatever, fine.”

Padma patted him on the head. “Great talk, Potter.” 

He stood and cracked his neck. “I’ll blame you when it all goes tits up, ok? Shall we get back out there?”

“Let’s go take some house points, Professor Potter.” 


	6. Quidditch and Collegiality

November first marked the start of the Quidditch season. The first match was Hufflepuff versus Slytherin. Addie and Patrick traded barbed remarks as they passed the HP sauce back and forth. No one else touched the stuff. Hufflepuff had easily won all the pre-season friendlies despite the extremely safe style of play Patrick coached them into. ("As a Healer," he told Harry one day, "I am allowed to have Views.") 

Harry buttered his toast and glanced about for Malfoy. He shouldn’t be expecting him. He never came to breakfast. Anticipation of the first match that thrummed in his veins. A good spar with Malfoy spiced up a Quidditch match like nothing else. But he’d promised Padma to give Malfoy a chance. Whatever that meant. 

Malfoy didn’t appear on the walk to the grounds. He still wasn’t there when the captains shook hands or when Andre blew the first whistle. 

Thirteen minutes in, just as Perry announced a second goal for Hufflepuff, “And they’ve really got legs, this Puff team, well, they’ve really got brooms, anyway, yes, thank you for the correction, Justin—” Malfoy appeared at his side, sweaty and a bit disheveled. His cheeks were pink from the cold breeze, and an emerald-and-yellow scarf hung around his neck. 

He straightened his neckwear, smoothed his hair back, and slid into the seat next to Harry. “Hello, Potter.” It was the only seat left, Harry reminded himself. Though the stand did seem a bit smaller than it had been before. 

Harry blinked. “You’ve got a half yellow scarf on.” 

“Yes?” Malfoy smiled. “I heard it’s the done thing to support all of one’s students.” He paused and gave Harry a once-over. “Though I don’t see that you’ve ascribed to that suggestion.”

“No, I was showing my support by arriving on time.”

“I was having a Floo call.”

Irritation pricked Harry. “And it must have been really important to take precedence over supporting your students.”

Malfoy sat up straighter and stared out at the pitch. “Certainly not, Potter, which is why I cut off my editor at ten exactly. I still forget that it takes time to get places without apparition.”

“You’ve an editor?”

Shooting him a sideways glance, Malfoy said in a tone of studied ease, “Yes, my second book is coming out later this year. Florian wanted to go over the proofs, and why he won’t just send them by owl is beyond me.” 

Bastian Khan, seated in the row in front of them, broke his grip on the edge of the box to turn around and look at Malfoy. “Draco, for Merlin’s sake, we’ve discussed this. That little Fortescue heir is wrapped around your finger. Don’t be coy and don’t make me miss something.” He turned back around, waving a hand so that a silencio charm separated them. 

Malfoy was now florid, and the crisp breeze had died down. He shook his head and muttered, “I don’t know what Khan is talking about.”

Harry’s stomach flipped. Disgusting, that someone could be wrapped around one of Malfoy’s fingers. That was the only way he got that book deal probably. Sheer lust-induced nepotism or something. Who would want to kiss his pointy, beardy face? Or mess up his stupidly blond hair? Malfoy probably whined about wrinkling his clothes when someone was taking them off and bossed his partners around in that haughty accent—Harry felt a bit lightheaded. 

A minute passed. He grunted in belated response. Malfoy looked at him strangely. 

“Are you all right, Potter? You look a bit … unwell.” 

Harry shook his head and continued to stare ahead, his eyes a bit glazed. 

“Having Dementor flashbacks, are we?” Malfoy smirked. Ah, he _was_ still a shit. 

“More like having visions of beating your ass at Quidditch,” Harry shot out. Well, that was random. Anything to keep his mind off where it had been. 

At that, Malfoy burst into laughter. The high, bright peal pressed against Bastian’s charm and he shot them a dire look. Minerva shot another spell at the two of them without turning around. 

Malfoy wouldn’t stop laughing. It wasn’t the screechy, evil cackle of his teen years. But it kept going and going, ringing in Harry’s ears until he yelled, “Shut up, Malfoy! It’s not funny. I’m much better than you at Quidditch. Shut up.”

Malfoy reached into his robes and withdrew a monogrammed handkerchief. Dabbing his eyes, he said, fighting to talk through his laughter, “I didn’t realize you thought about my ass so much during Quidditch.”

“I do not fucking—I was saying you suck ass at Quidditch—fuck you—you’re impossible. Get your mind out of the gutter.” Harry balled his fists up. He was trying to be an adult here, and then he just catapulted back to his irate schoolboy self. Ready to fight. Ready to hit harder, give worse. Malfoy was such a fucking idiot. 

Malfoy’s laughter subsided into a gentle shaking of shoulders. 

“Honestly, Potter, your face. It’s so easy to rile you up.”

“It’s an expression,” Harry said sharply. “I taught it to my sixth-years last week. Important Muggle slang.”

“Ah,” said Malfoy with a raised eyebrow, “It tends to be more literal in the wizarding world. When one says ass,” he gestured with one hand, his silver ring glinting in the sunlight, “one tends to mean it.” 

“Whatever.”

There was a silence, broken only by the now-muffled sounds from the pitch. 

Malfoy crossed his legs and laced his fingers together over his knee. 

“Care to explain why you’re talking to me again? Couldn’t resist my charms?” 

He’d promised Padma. Chance number three, here we go. Be the bigger man. No, don’t think about that. Nope. Eyes forward, Potter. 

“You’re such a dick,” was what came out of Harry’s mouth. 

“So, you’ve been thinking about me,” Malfoy said with a little smile. 

“Padma said we should be collegiate.”

“Collegial?”

“You’re a fucking prick,” Harry said with a laugh. “You honestly can’t stop yourself, can you?”

“Nope.” Malfoy popped the word with a grin.

This grinning, windblown Malfoy was so different than the sneering, controlled Malfoy of Harry’s youth. He knew what had happened, but he didn’t really know what had _happened_. It was also miles from the serious Malfoy who’d faced him and spilled out his past. How many versions of Malfoy were there? Was there one that was Draco? 

Harry looked, really looked, at him in the clear sunlight. Malfoy squinted up into the sky, wrinkling the skin around his eyes and across his forehead as he followed the match. The wind ruffled his white-blonde hair, and he pushed it back behind one ear without taking his eyes off the field. He reached into his robes, withdrew a glasses case, and put on a pair of black Ray Bans.

_What the fuck?_ thought Harry. _Why does Malfoy have trendy Muggle sunglasses? _

_And then, why don’t I have those sunglasses? _

Malfoy caught him staring and said archly, “Yes, Potter?” 

“It’s just a look,” he said. “Robes and sunglasses and scarf—it’s a lot.”

Malfoy’s pale eyebrows rose above his glasses. 

“I’ve always been a lot,” he said eventually. “You should know that more than anyone else.”

Harry grunted and turned his attention back to the pitch.

True to his words, Malfoy cheered equally for both teams, though his polite clapping was somewhat overshadowed by Harry’s wolf-whistle. It lasted a whopping five hours before the Hufflepuff seeker grabbed the snitch just under the professors’ box while falling off her broom. Harry had to close his eyes, but there was a hand on his arm and a voice whispering, “Andre’s got her, don’t worry.” He opened his eyes and looked down at the pale fingers rubbing the flannel of his sleeve. Malfoy blushed and drew his hand back. They both looked away. 

He should have said thank you. 

What he did instead was cough and stand up. Pull his sleeves down over his hands. Bang his shin. Lurch over. Curse. 

Found his elbow in Malfoy’s steadying hands. Again. 

Now he had to say thank you.

Malfoy let go again. 

“Ta,” Harry managed. 

There was a pause and Malfoy smiled. 

“Thanks,” Harry choked, “for letting me know—”

“It’s fine,” Malfoy interrupted. “I know I’m the one who—”

Harry shook his head violently. “Nope. Don’t.”

Malfoy pursed his lips. “Well, I was a shit about it.”

“Ta,” Harry said again. When did he start saying ta? Aunt Petunia would shit a brick. 

That was enough, he decided, and shuffled past Malfoy, who was still sitting like a right lump on the bench and folding and unfolding his sunglasses. 

Harry didn’t look back on the way down the bleachers. He had to wipe his hands on his pants twice. 

* * *

Three hours later, Harry woke up from a sweaty nap to an insistent paper crane tapping his forehead. He grabbed it, rolled over to reach for his glasses on the nightstand, and heard a crunch.

“Fuck.” He had found his glasses.

A quick _reparo_, and he unfolded the crane. 

The curling green ink read: _Potter, thanks for today. Here’s to collegiality. _

It was signed with a single x and the initials D.M. 

Harry flopped back onto the bed and groaned. 

What the fuck was Malfoy playing at now?


	7. A Rather Infamous Faculty Meeting

The new plan regarding Malfoy was to act normal. To treat him like any other colleague. Well, not like Mervyn, who Harry actively avoided because the older wizard was a bit like Trelawney in his insistence on Harry’s current endangerment and mutterings about Fate and Star-Crossed Lovers Intertwining, whatever that meant. But like Addie. Or Padma. Well, maybe Padma was a bit too close. He and Malfoy would never be that close. But they did get to the point where sitting next to each other at meals didn’t start any disasters or spur Harry to drink more heavily than usual—God, maybe he should give up drinking—but they weren’t close. 

It wasn’t as though Malfoy was chummy. They did spend a few hours a week discussing upcoming lesson plans. Malfoy didn’t know much about the O.W.L. or N.E.W.T. reform, so Harry filled him in on the new standardized levels and the focus on experiential learning. Malfoy would roll his eyes and go off into some lecture (honestly) about how lecturing was a time-tested method that helped younger students form a narrative from a series of disconnected historical facts and how this was a much more age-appropriate introduction to historical research and methodology than digging through the archives, which they could get into if they decided to pursue a post-N.E.W.T. year or go on to graduate work in the field. Harry would groan and insist that lectures were tedious and multiple studies had shown that students actually remembered their hands-on lessons. That wasn’t friendliness. That was just two colleagues debating teaching methodologies. Once a week. For at least four hours. Usually over a scotch or two. 

Then it was mid-November and he was sliding a lemon cream biscuit onto Malfoy’s saucer at a faculty meeting. 

Malfoy winked at him before turning back to his notes.

“Put that in the minutes, mind,” Harry said, tapping Malfoy’s book. “Charity begins at home.” He knew what the minutes were, now. Not that he’d read them. But he knew that Malfoy wasn’t just taking devious notes in a giant book. He was trying, God forbid, to be helpful. 

Malfoy snorted and continued writing the date in his elegant longhand.

At least he used a refillable fountain pen instead of a quill. He had enchanted it to look like a white peacock feather. He was still a Malfoy. Though maybe it was the Black penchant for theatrics. God, Sirius would have laughed. 

Padma smirked across the table and Harry narrowed his eyes. 

Then Addie slid into the seat beside her and Padma lost interest in Harry. 

He was left tapping his fingers along the table as the rest of the faculty and staff filed into the headmaster’s office and gathered their tea things. The room was filled with a gentle hum of chat. 

“Potter, stop fiddling,” Malfoy sniped. “You’re jostling the table.”

Harry flicked him a two-fingered salute just as Minerva got up from her desk. She looked at him with a grimace. She didn’t like meetings either. Dumping a pile of papers at the head of the table, she went to the tea cart and returned with a steaming cup. With a sigh, she gestured for everyone to take their seats. 

The meeting began and Harry felt everything glaze over. 

Filius was complaining about graffiti in the Ravenclaw boys’ bathroom. Blink. Owain the Groundskeeper brought up the dangers of the escaped Flesh-Eating Slugs, to which Hagrid raised a valiant defense that had Harry questioning whether Hagrid believed in containing any kind of dangerous animal, which seemed like taking Gryffindor courage a bit too far. Patrick broke in and said he’d had several kids with facial disfigurements and a curious unwillingness to discuss the circumstances of their injuries in the Hospital Wing, which, to him, strongly suggested that the fucking bairns were throwing them at each other. 

Minerva took off her hat and rubbed her forehead. Hagrid was sputtering and insisting that the slugs didn’t mean to hurt anyone. 

Malfoy had paused midway through Patrick’s tirade and met Harry’s eyes. 

“Do I write ‘fucking bairns,’ do you think?” he whispered, almost without moving his mouth.

Harry snorted, then busied himself with his teacup.

“They’re on the third-year exams,” Hagrid said, stabbing one large finger into the table. “We’ve got to have ‘em.”

Owain shot his eyes at Minerva and then at Lachlan Leith, who had taken over Filch’s role with a penchant for restoration and a distaste for shackles. Placatingly, Lachlan talked Hagrid down by promising to make him a special slug cage that strictly required Hagrid’s magical signature to open. 

“You’ve got to keep them in there,” Owain said plaintively. “They’re havoc on the cabbages.” Padma smothered a giggle by biting into a biscuit. 

Ednie, the elected representative of the Hogwarts Elf Union, raised a thin finger and said in a high voice. “Owain’s right. Cabbage Roll Thursday had to be scrapped!”

Addie grinned. The dungeons classrooms were notoriously ill-ventilated.

Harry let himself drift away again before he lost his poker face. Blink. Addie was pushing for a scholarship fund for gold cauldrons, which were required for many N.E.W.T.s potions. Harry voted in favor. He’d wanted a gold cauldron once. Hagrid hadn’t let him. He couldn’t imagine Snape’s face if tiny eleven-year-old Potter had rolled up with a solid gold cauldron.

“Then there’s the issue of the Winter Ball—” Harry snapped back. This was his shit. “Professor Potter has proposed that a wizarding ‘dee-jay’ be hired to play magical and Muggle songs.” 

“Absolutely not.” 

Malfoy slammed his quill down. A huge emerald blot blossomed on the minutes. 

There was a silence before Harry burst out.

“Why not?” Harry shot back, confused. “Half those kids grew up Muggle! It’s their culture to have a DJ! Not a dumb singer like Celestia Warbeck or some washed-up fucks like the Weird Sisters! They played at our Yule Ball. In 1994. It’s 2006.”

Malfoy shook his head and said adamantly, “Absolutely not. No Muggle songs.”

Harry inhaled and tried to remember his meditation tactics. _Why was Malfoy being such a shit suddenly? Had he reverted to fucking blood purism? Wizards first? _He’d winked at Harry fifteen minutes ago, for God’s sake. _What the fuck was happening. _

Minerva steepled her fingers and asked, “What are your objections, Professor Malfoy?”

“I believe a DJ will invite certain styles of dancing that are definitely not appropriate, Headmaster.” 

All the heads swiveled to Harry. 

“What?” he said, like an idiot. So, this wasn’t about pureblood tradition? 

With wide eyes, Malfoy continued: “I have, perhaps, researched contemporary Muggle music—” 

“Which we discuss in my class,” Harry shot back. “Not yours.”

Heads flicked between them, watching the volleys. 

“Yes, Potter, exactly. I came across one of the fifth-years demonstrating a rather—” he inhaled—“rude dance for a group of her peers and she said you’d demonstrated this dance in class!” 

“I did n—oh.” Harry was hit with a memory of Britney egging him on. _You have to show them, Professor Potter, they don’t believe that grinding is real. They think I’m trolling them. Just play some Beyoncé or like Akon and do one body roll, just—_fucking Britney and Justin. That O.W.L. class was going to be the death of him. 

“Potter,” Minerva said sharply, “are you teaching fifteen-year-olds some kind of erotic dance?”

Addie snorted. The older professors looked like someone had just dropped them here from another dimension. Padma was vibrating with barely-suppressed laughter. Bastian had his lips pursed. 

Malfoy’s eyes were wide with innocence and—oh shit. Too much innocence. Too much fucking innocence and he’d fucking planned this. Malfoy pressed his lips together, but he couldn’t stop the corners of his mouth quirking up in a shit-eating grin. Well, two could play at that game. Malfoy may be underhanded, but Harry had sass Malfoy could only dream of. 

“I believe Professor Malfoy is referring to one of my more, uh, practical lessons regarding contemporary Muggle life,” Harry said smoothly. He pushed his chair away from the table, stood, and shrugged out of his robes before stalking over to stand behind Malfoy. 

“Our students are expected to know the ins and outs of Muggle life. The arts. The culture. High and low,” Harry said and pulled Malfoy’s chair back. “This type of dance is common in Muggle dancing establishments, known colloquially as ‘clubs.’ An important part of Muggle social life is an event called ‘clubbing,’ in which a group of Muggles gather to drink and dance to music like this—” he raised a finger and conjured a CD player. He set it down on the table, thumped it twice.

As the opening beat of Akon’s ‘Smack That’ began to thrum through the air, he smiled down at Malfoy’s platinum blond head. 

“If Professor Malfoy would care to help out a colleague, I’d appreciate it,” he said with a smile. He could have pointy teeth too. 

Malfoy didn’t move, but said airily, “I’m sure you can demonstrate adequately on your own, Potter. I wouldn’t want to overshadow you.”

He wasn’t sure that he’d get a DJ at the Winter Ball after this, but, c’est la vie. Malfoy started it. And then he was dismissive about Harry’s dancing ability. Which he had, fuck you Malfoy, finely honed in Muggle clubs over the last five years. When Malfoy was off with the Japanese monks or whatever. 

Harry bumped up the volume with a wand swish, tucked his wand behind one ear, and went to fucking town. He twirled around Malfoy’s chair, dropping low and rising up, making sure he stuck his ass mostly at Malfoy and not at Minerva. Only one of them had asked for it. Or kind of asked for it. 

_Smack that all on the floor, smack that, give me some more. _

He rolled his hips for a few beats. 

_Step in the club, the wardrobe intact now. _

Straddle the chair, drop down, don’t actually touch him, but close enough. One hip thrust up. And another. There were centimeters between them. The air was vibrating. 

_ Money no problem, pocket full of that now. _

Make it rain. Make it rain. Once around the chair, spin. 

_ Maybe go to my place and just kick it like tae bo; and possibly bend ya over. _

And now, the Eminem bridge was a good place for some shoulder work. 

_ Trying to hold my woody back through my drawers. _

Malfoy was scarlet and had his eyes fixed on a point far, far away. Harry ran one finger from his lips down his own torso, never taking his eyes off Malfoy. 

_ Plus, from the club to the crib’s like a mile away. _

One body roll, two body rolls. 

_ Smack that ‘til you get sore. Smack that, oh, oh, oh. _

Eye contact, lick lips, drop squat, run hands through hair, point at Malfoy, keep the eye contact going, wink. And, scene. 

Harry flicked his wand at the CD player and it went silent. 

He wasn’t sure if he still had a job. 

The blood was rushing in his ears. 

Then there was a wolf-whistle and Addie leapt up clapping. “That’s my boy, Potter! Fucking work!” 

Minerva began to laugh. Hagrid looked as though someone had stepped on his foot. Filius was nodding, moving his shoulders from side to side. Audrey swayed and clapped arrhythmically. Padma was wiping her tears with one long sleeve. 

He looked down at Malfoy, whose nostrils were flaring. Harry reached out and ruffled his hair. 

“Wasn’t so bad, was it?” he whispered and winked again. 

Malfoy wasn’t breathing. 

Without meaning to, his eyes flicked down to Malfoy’s lap. Malfoy pressed his lips together until they went white and crossed his legs suddenly and adjusted his robes. 

Interesting. 

Very. Interesting. 

But that pathway was dangerous, so Harry turned his attention to the rest of his colleagues. Time to argue that what he’d just done was educational. “As you can see, while it can be a rather insinuating style of dancing, it also doesn’t involve any actual sexual activity.”

“Like flamenco!” Filius cried. “Or salsa!”

“Additionally, what I just performed was the most flamboyantly erotic version of this type of dance, which, I might add, I did not teach the students. Perhaps a few isolated moves were demonstrated to the minors in my care, but certainly none of the more sensual ones.” Harry shrugged. Acting casual was difficult. Catching his breath was harder. 

“I could demonstrate further sub-styles, rap, hip-hop, whatever. I’m no dancing fiend, but I do know a few moves.”

There was a strangled noise from Malfoy’s chair. 

Minerva said with a smile, “Since we all will be chaperoning, I’m sure we can break up any of the more inappropriate maneuvers. If necessary, I’m sure a simple _Ebublio_ would deter the more … frenzied students. If there are no further objections, I would support Professor Potter’s motion to have a wizarding dee-jay. All opposed?”

No sound. 

“All in favor?” 

A general grumble of approval broken by Addie’s cheers. Harry flopped into his chair and sipped his tea. 

The rest of the meeting passed in a blur. 

Malfoy rose quickly and stormed out of the room the minute it was over. He had abandoned his quill, Harry noticed, picking it up and twirling it in his fingers. The minutes were unfinished. Harry pulled the book towards him and scratched in: _Wizarding DJ approved for the Winter Ball after riveting practical demonstration of Muggle dancing by Pr. H. J. Potter. No other important business. Meeting adjourned at 4:23 pm. _

Potter, 1. Malfoy, 0. 

_I could have tortured him with SexyBack,_ Harry thought, and grinned. He tucked the quill behind one ear and saluted Minnie on the way out. 

So much for acting normal around Malfoy.


	8. A Disastrous Hair Cut

Harry started feeling remorseful three hours later. What if Malfoy hadn’t figured it out fast enough to refuse? And Harry hadn’t touched him, but there was that frission. That tension. They hadn’t talked about the gay thing since those awkward conversations weeks ago. Maybe Malfoy thought Harry was making fun of him. Waiting to dangle it over his head somehow. Use it against him. 

It started gnawing at him when Malfoy didn’t show up to dinner. He couldn’t stop jiggling his knee. Addie summoned an unused napkin and levitated it towards him. Harry gave her a confused look and she rolled her eyes.

“For Draco? Make him a sandwich.” Before he could protest, she laughed and said, “He wants someone to come looking for him. Might as well be you, Potter, since you’re the one who put his nose out of joint.” 

Harry narrowed his eyes but dutifully assembled a dry turkey sandwich. A pot of mayonnaise appeared at his elbow just as he was considering how grim it was. Then a bowl of freshly-washed lettuce. And a plate with tomato slices. 

Well, fine, if that’s how it was going to be.

He shook out his own napkin and tucked two pieces of treacle tart inside. 

Then he was knocking on Malfoy’s door. There was no response, so he banged harder. 

Malfoy opened the door suddenly and Harry tripped across the threshold.

He looked rumpled, like he’d just woken up. “Breaking into my room, Potter?”

Harry tried to back up but Malfoy had already closed the door. 

“Hardly,” he said. “You opened the door.” 

He thrust out the napkin with the sandwich inside. Malfoy took it and padded over to his desk to unwrap it. 

Harry took advantage of his silence to look around Malfoy’s quarters. The entire room was covered with a plush emerald rug, but it was barely visible between piles of paper and books and clothes. There were two armchairs by the fireplace (how come he got two?). 

Malfoy, mouth filled with sandwich, motioned to one of the chairs. Harry sat down and stretched his hands out to the crackling blaze. He continued his visual perambulation, tallying family photographs (one of him and Narcissa on a beach, the other him holding Teddy’s hand in a garden somewhere), Slytherin paraphernalia (a scarf, some kind of plaque, a small silver cup, and, most intriguing, a stuffed snake on the bed), clothes (all over the floor—how did he always look so pressed?), the absolute state of his desk (teetering with papers, it almost gave Harry vertigo), the pots and bottles cluttering the top of his dresser, the broom propped in the corner (was that a Firebolt?), the open closet door spilling even more robes into the room (how many clothes could one person own?), the several handwritten letters and cards tacked to his full-length mirror. 

“So, you live in a tip, then?”

Malfoy rolled his eyes. “Fuck off, Potter. One, I can find whatever I need, and two, I tip the elves extra extra at Christmas.”

Harry panicked. “Fuck, we’re supposed to?”

“Christmas bonus, honestly. The union ensures that they’re paid fairly, but it’s nice to have a bit more for the holidays.” He continued eating his sandwich. “One would think you’d never had help.”

Harry squinted. Was Malfoy trolling him?

“I haven’t,” he said eventually. “I was the help at my aunt and uncle’s.”

Malfoy’s eyes bulged. “You what?” 

There was a bit of tomato sludge on his chin.

Gesturing at the tomato, which Malfoy hurriedly wiped away with his hand, he shrugged. “You know, cooking, cleaning, gardening, whatever. When they let me out.”

“Let you out from where?” Malfoy laid his sandwich back on the napkin and leaned towards him. 

“Uh, the cupboard, mostly. When I was little, anyway.”

This was veering into dangerous territory. He’d come here to make sure Malfoy was fine, which he clearly was, eating the sandwich like a ravenous hippogriff, until Harry had opened his fat mouth about something he really, really didn’t want to talk about.

“What—”

“It’s fine,” Harry said. “How’s your sandwich?” 

Malfoy looked as though he’d forgotten he had a sandwich. He picked it up, then put it down again. “When you say cupboard, you mean a small room, right?”

Harry shook his head and grit his teeth. “Nope, cupboard under the stairs. Sandwich?”

Malfoy took a small bite. “Lovely thank you.” He chewed. “That’s child abuse.”

Harry shrugged. “Whatever.”

“Shit, Harry, no,” Malfoy said. He looked distressed. “That’s awful.”

“Yeah, I’m fine now.”

Malfoy shifted towards him. Harry didn’t know what that was about, but he was done with this sympathy nonsense, so he leapt out of the chair and pretended to be interested in the plaque on Malfoy’s mantle. 

_To Draco Malfoy, Slytherin Seeker, in Commemoration of, _but then he couldn’t read the smaller text through the tarnished blotches. He ran his fingers over the silver frame of a waving picture of Draco, Pansy, and Blaise. Pansy was hanging off Draco’s side and sticking her tongue out and Blaise was kissing Draco’s cheek, over and over. 

Harry tapped the glass. “So, like, are you and Blaise together?” Malfoy hacked up a bite of sandwich. 

“Merlin, no!” he gasped. He grabbed a nearby cup of tea, chugged some, and shook his head. “God, no, he’s just super affectionate with us. He can’t express much emotion at work.”

“Isn’t he an Auror? I think Ron works with him sometimes.”

Malfoy shook his head again. “He’s an Unspeakable. Very cloak-and-dagger shit. Absolutely no intra-office drama allowed. So, of course, everyone’s fucking like rabbits. But no feelings. None.”

Harry wrinkled his nose. “Weird.” 

“Yeah, but he has me and Pansy and he doesn’t want anything else right now, so, like, whatever.” He popped the crust into his mouth, and then said, half around it, “I couldn’t handle that at all.”

“What? Being an Unspeakable?” 

Malfoy swallowed. Harry was put in mind of a snake unhinging its jaw. He could practically see the lump move down his throat. “No, the no-strings-attached stuff.”

For some reason, this irritated Harry. He wanted to say something cutting, but then he remembered the mission of Operation Sandwich, which was to see if Malfoy was alright (he was) and perhaps ask for forgiveness (which didn’t seem like such a pressing issue anymore). 

“Messing about’s alright,” Harry said finally. 

Malfoy pinked a bit. “Well, yes, I didn’t mean to say it wasn’t, or like, to slut-shame anyone.” He folded the napkin and set it on the arm of his chair. “I’m just … not good at it.” The last four words were almost a whisper. 

Harry laughed and ran his hands through his hair.

“Wow, Malfoy admits something he’s not good at.”

Malfoy shifted in his chair.

“What a moment. Mind if I take a mental snapshot?”

“Oh, fuck off, Potter, like you’re some kind of sex god?!”

“My dancing didn’t convince you?” Harry said and wiggled his hips. 

“Oh, Merlin,” Malfoy groaned and covered his face. He kept talking, but it was so muffled that Harry had no idea what he was on about. He managed to pick out, “absolute prat,” “Jesus H. Christ,” and “wiggly,” none of which sounded terribly flattering.

“Actually,” he attempted a more serious tone. “That’s why I came.” Harry sat back down in the other armchair and tried for remorse. 

Malfoy peeked out from behind one hand.

“I didn’t mean to make fun of you or put you in a weird position at the meeting today. I just thought you were trolling me, and wanted to give you a taste of your own medicine. I’m sorry if it was too much.”

Malfoy dropped his hands and stared at Harry. Harry felt a bit skewered. 

“You’ve always been too much,” Malfoy said. 

Harry didn’t know what to say. There thrill running down his spine. Up his spine. Tingling in his pelvis. Thrumming in his neck. Was he becoming ill?

Malfoy who refused to break eye contact.

“I thought you were too much,” Harry managed. This conversation had veered off somewhere strange and he wasn’t really sure what these euphemisms were meant to euphemize. Was Malfoy coming onto him? “That’s what you said at the match.” Bolster that with some facts. Concrete facts.

Malfoy looked away and shrugged. Harry felt like he was missing something. There was something that was just out of his reach, and he didn’t—

“Look, Malfoy, what are we talking about?”

Malfoy shrugged again and pressed his lips together. 

“It doesn’t matter.”

“No, it does, I want to know.” He felt like he had to say something else. “I’m your colleague, and like, maybe your friend?” 

Malfoy laughed once. “Ah, yes. Yeah. Yep. No, it doesn’t matter.” 

He seemed to have retreated to somewhere in his mind and curled up a bit more in his chair. “Thanks for the sandwich, Potter.”

Harry knew a dismissal when he heard it. Something had gone wrong and he wasn’t really sure how or what or why. 

“Yeah, Malfoy, no worries. Just missed you at dinner and wanted to make sure you were ok.”

He didn’t know what he was supposed to say, so he just waved (goofily, mind you) at Malfoy, who gave him a half-hearted two-fingered salute, and let himself out. Harry spent the rest of the evening in confused repose. He penned a note to Hermione and Ron asking if he could come around next weekend, sent it off with Ulula, spent some time trying to trim his hair with his wand but that was such a disaster (it looked like he’d been attacked with gardening shears) that he panicked and found himself outside Andre’s door, hoping the older wizard was in. 

Luckily, Andre answered the door. He was wearing a midnight-blue silk robe and had a mug of hot chocolate in one hand.

“Harry,” he said with a question in his voice.

“Andre, I’ve fucked up my hair,” Harry said. 

Andre raised his eyebrows but mercifully didn’t comment and ushered him in. 

“I’m glad you’re in. I don’t know what to do.”

“Cocoa?”

“Uh, sure.”

“Firewhiskey?”

“Uh, ok.”

Andre moved with a fluid grace that even his limp didn’t undermine. Harry knew he’d been the Keeper at Puddlemere United and then Pride of Portree until the crash. 

“Why’d you ask me?” Andre said and handed Harry a cup of spiked hot chocolate. 

Harry looked confused. 

“You and I have … very different hair.” Andre gestured to his tight curls. “I mean, Bastian or Draco probably have hair more like yours.”

Harry laughed. “Pshh, Draco. Whatever.”

Andre quirked his lips and said, “I see,” in a pensive tone. 

“See what?”

“Oh, no, nothing, if you don’t want to talk about it.”

Harry gulped some cocoa down. Damn, it was quite hot and the Firewhiskey didn’t help.

“It’s good,” he said, looking at his mug.

Andre hummed and asked, “What are you thinking for your hair?” 

“I was just trying to trim it a bit. And I got a bit carried away and confused.”

“Sit, sit,” Andre herded him towards a stool, and then ran his fingers through Harry’s hair diagnostically. “Hm, yeah, I’ll just even it out a bit.”

There was silence while Andre set to work with his wand.

“I used to do makeovers at school,” Andre said and chuckled. “I gave Audrey a makeover once a year, it seemed like. She was always getting into trouble and ruining something. Sweaters, shoes, hair … you know I had to make her outfit for the famous Puddifoot date?” 

“What?” Harry asked. He took advantage of the pause by gulping down more cocoa. 

Andre’s voice floated across the room, where he was clattering about with jars of pomade.

“She looked like a milkmaid. And then there was the black lipstick phase. I mean, you’ve seen it. She’s still obsessed with strange colors of lipstick. Green, orange, mauve.” Andre’s voice was fond. “But honestly, I don’t think Talbott would have noticed if she wore a paper bag.”

He returned and ran his fingers through Harry’s hair again. It smelled like pine and amber. 

“Yeah, I can’t imagine wearing a paper bag around Malfoy. He’d absolutely take the piss.”

“You’re done,” Andre said, tapping him on the shoulder with his wand.

Harry took ahold of the levitating mirror and checked himself out.

Jesus, Andre had made him hot. He’d shortened the hair on the sides of his head and cleaned up the top bit, so it looked slightly damp but in a cool and carefree way. Fuck, he wasn’t half-bad looking.

Andre handed him a small green glass jar marked with spindly handwriting. “My grandmother makes it,” he said. “She knew your grandda and I think she ripped off Sleekeazy a bit. Well, more like tweaked it a bit for more textured hair.” He shrugged. “She’s completely unrepentant and she doesn’t make money off it, so, please, even though you’re the heir, don’t sue us.”

Harry laughed. Was he the heir? He should probably look into that. He’d gotten occasional letters from the company, but he could have sworn his grandfather had sold it when he retired. 

Andre sat back down in the armchair, stared at Harry, and tilted his head to one side. He rotated one earring and said consideringly, “I think our dear Professor Malfoy will have a shock in the morning.” 

Yeah, whatever that meant. Why did Andre keep bringing up Malfoy? (Why did Harry keep bringing up Malfoy?) Harry stuttered out his thanks and downed the rest of his cocoa. He paused for a minute looking at a few snapshots of Andre holding a baby and Audrey peering over his shoulder, an older black woman handing a cup to Andre (they were both dressed in Pride of Portree jerseys), Andre with a ginger man and Oliver Wood—

“Wait, you know Oliver?”

“Oh, yeah, Ollie and I are old mates. We were at Pudd together for a bit. I go and visit him and Percy a lot.”

“Wait, that’s Percy?” The ginger-haired man in the photograph, arm slung loosely around Oliver’s shoulders, was wearing rimless glasses and a tank. When Harry squinted, he could see how reedy, nerdy Percy had grown up to be a fucking hunk, but still? Percy was hot now?! 

“Oh, yeah,” Andre said. “I forgot you knew him. Ollie’s cleaned him up a bit. But he keeps Ollie organized and like, doing something other than Quidditch, so they’re good together.”

“Wait,” said Harry. “They’re together?”

Andre quirked his head a bit. 

“Yeah? They’re engaged? That’s why Ollie transferred to the Cannons. Pudd wanted him to keep his engagement secret. Bullshit,” Andre said, cracking his knuckles. 

“They’re engaged?!”

“Oh,” Andre said. “Right, you’re friends with the family.”

“Wait, what?”

Andre looked down at his half-full mug. “Percy’s not sure how his parents would react to him and Ollie.”

“Wait, seriously?” Harry was shocked. “Molly would be over the moon to get another son-in-law. She dotes on her boys! And even more on the boys that she got later in life!” He paused. “I guess Percy hasn’t been around since Ginny came out, though. Molly tried to knit a sweater that says “Proud Mom to Gay Kids” but it came out a bit lumpy and looks like it says “Proud Gay Mom” but like, she still wears it.”

Andre was blinking a lot suddenly. 

“Andre, please. Tell him it’s ok. Tell him his parents miss him. Please. God. I’ll get Ron or Ginny or someone to write him.” 

Andre croaked, “Yeah, I’ll tell him to write.”

“Fuck, mate, that’s wild. Percy and Oliver engaged. Wow.” Harry laughed. “Wait, how do I get invited to the wedding?”

Andre laughed. “You could always be my plus one.” Harry raised his eyebrows. “Oh, god, no, no, no, I’m way too old for you. Friends. Plus-one-friend. All I need is a drinking buddy and I already know you’re decent on the dancefloor.” 

Harry laughed, and then the two of them were laughing hysterically and wiping away tears—of joy, of sorrow, it was a bit unclear. Andre walked him to the door and batted his hands away from his hair.

“It’s magical pomade. Just stop messing about with it and it’ll look good for a week.” 

And it did. 

It looked so good that one Draco Malfoy walked straight into a chair in the Great Hall.

But like, they were just friends. 


	9. Into December

Hagrid’s birthday rolled around on December 6. The celebrations were myriad—his first years all teamed up to eat an entire rock cake he’d baked, four third-year Hufflepuffs made him a stuffed version of Fang, his O.W.L. and N.E.W.T. classes pooled their money to buy him a new pink umbrella for “days out with Madame,” according to the card. The professors brought Madame Maxine in on an international Portkey. The Great Hall was bedecked with Gryffindor banners (probably the only time it would be that year, thought Harry ruefully; without Dumbledore’s annual points bonanza, they sank to a dismal fourth place). Hagrid, hand in hand with Madame Maxine, sobbed as the elves levitated a huge cake with “HAPPEE BIRTHDAY HAGRID” written in green icing (Harry had let them in on the inside joke) and Minerva had to lend him a handkerchief. He blew his nose so hard that a nearby firstie fell over. Luckily Malfoy was there and propped Helga back up, patting her on the head in a rather avuncular manner.

Harry hadn’t seen Ron and Hermione for weeks—she was in the middle of a massive trial and sent him a regretful note on the back of what turned out to be an important piece of paperwork that he’d had to return, and Ron was in Dublin for a three-week international magical policing seminar—and their absence was starting to grate on him. There wasn’t anyone else who knew him as well as they did. He’d grown close to Padma in the last few weeks, but she and Addie had (finally!) kissed and were inseparable. Everyone else was too old or spent their weekends away from the castle. 

So, he ended up hanging out, properly hanging out, with Malfoy. It was his only option. 

Malfoy seemed to think that if he ignored the dancing and the following awkward conversation, he and Harry could settle into a friendship. And it was a friendship. For them, at least. They weren’t any less snarky, but Harry had managed to hex him only once, when Malfoy insisted that French strawberries were, always had been, and always would be superior. Malfoy looked disappointed as bogies shot out of his nose (“What are you, twelve?” he’d said after a singular _Finite Incantantem _ended the stream). Harry was a bit abashed and brought him two lemon biscuits at the next faculty meeting. 

One morning, when Harry was puttering around in his boxers trying to find the small jar of magical pomade Andre had gifted him (“From me and Perc and Ollie, don’t worry about it.”) in his dresser—honestly, Kreacher thought he had a better organizational system than anyone and it just didn’t mesh with Harry’s mind at all—a cold wind blasted across his shins. 

He turned around. Somehow Malfoy had opened his window and flown in? 

What the fuck? 

Malfoy, dressed entirely in tight black Quidditch leathers, awkwardly straddled his broom. There wasn’t enough room to turn back around and fly out the floor-to-ceiling window, but he was just standing there like a lump. 

“Jesus, Malfoy, what are you doing?” Harry scrambled to find a jumper and closed the window with a spell across the room.

“I thought this was my room!” Malfoy yelped. “The window’s all fogged and I thought I left my light on and—shouldn’t you be at breakfast?”

Harry groaned. “I’m trying to find the hair stuff Andre gave me. It’s a fucking tiny jar, and Kreacher’s tucked it away somewhere and—wait, why are you flying?”

Malfoy swung one leg over the broom and turned around to brush snow from the bristles. He bent over the broom and his ass—

Right, Potter. Stop objectifying your colleagues.

(Well, one colleague.)

(Was it Harry’s fault no one else was even remotely hot?)

(Or even vaguely single?)

(Yes. Yes, it was.)

(Shut up.)

Anyway, clearly Malfoy had been working out. But whatever.

“I fly every morning. Just to keep my hand in.”

Harry crossed his arms. Malfoy’s eyes tracked every move. The jumper was wool and rather scratchy on his bare chest. “We could fly together sometime. I bet I’m still better than you.” Malfoy tilted his head and looked at him consideringly. “Seekers’ challenge?”

“Sure. Tomorrow, you’re on.” 

“Alright,” Malfoy said and slung the broom over his shoulder. “See you on the pitch at six-thirty.” He was out of the room in a shot.

Well, fuck, that was early. 

When the alarm went off the next morning, Harry groaned. He wished Dean was here to throw pillows at him until he got up. God, he missed sleeping near people. It wasn’t even a sexual thing. He just felt so … lonely. Eight years of dormitory life was heaven to a little boy who’d spent most of his childhood alone, under the stairs. 

Eighth year had been a dream—it was what school should have been all along. No one was trying to kill him. Only Seamus and Ron roasted him, and that was always with affection. Turns out he excelled at DADA, Muggle Studies, Charms, and Transfiguration when he wasn’t possessed. He tutored younger students and realized that this—teaching—was what he loved. Dumbledore’s Army should have been a clue, but now he knew, down in his bones, that he was an educator. But more than anything he loved waking up in his dorm and listening to his best friend snore Saturday mornings away. At least until Hermione stormed up the stairs and herded them to breakfast and the library. Harry was usually waiting for her, tucked up with some new Agatha Christie or Angela Thirkell (yeah, he had the reading taste of a grandma; it was all about comfort and coziness, deal with it), and would spring out of bed fully dressed to shake Ron awake before she barreled into the boys’ dorm. 

It wasn’t all good. God, there were so many nightmares. Screaming and crying and they were all a bit fucked up. But they were all there, together, and they made it through. 

Ginny and Luna found each other. And Harry came out as bi. He’d started WAWFAN then, bolstered by Hermione’s frantic poster- and button-making, and even if the first meeting was just him, Dean, Seamus, Ginny, Luna, Neville, and Hermione, he was grateful. (Ron had thought it was the following Tuesday. He’d been left to his own devices and had fallen asleep down in the Quidditch shed. Ron slept a lot. The scars from the Ministry still drained his energy.) It picked up speed several months later, with a young Slytherin came up to Harry after the meeting in tears because he didn’t think he belonged in the girls’ dorms—he was a boy. A sixth bed appeared in the Slytherin boy’s dorm that night, and each house was expanded by a set of gender-inclusive dorms. As the atmosphere in the castle became more and more welcoming, non-binary students filled those dorms too. Harry kissed his first boy, a kind sixth-year Ravenclaw named Stephen, and had a few good afternoons figuring things out before Stephen told him he wasn’t ready for a serious boyfriend, let alone dating the most famous guy in the British wizarding world; Harry was flattered and mortified. There was too much firewhiskey, too many games of Exploding Snap in the back of Binns’ class, too many Canary Creams slipped into beakers of hot chocolate. 

They’d all passed their classes, more or less, and then they’d graduated—the first and hopefully only eighth-years Hogwarts would ever see.

Harry’s alarm blared again and Ulula started screeching in protest. He groped around for his sports gear. He didn’t have Quidditch leathers anymore, just joggers and trainers, but he did have the Nimbus 2005, so Malfoy could suck on that. 

He made to the pitch at 6:37 and landed with a thump next to one of the regulation kit boxes. 

Malfoy, who was sitting side saddle on his hovering broom, said, “Punctual as ever.”

“It’s foggy.”

“Ah, blaming the weather before we’ve even started.”

Malfoy’s gaze was back to piercing. He gave Harry a once-over, pausing on the grey joggers with a considering hum, and then laughed at Harry’s shoes. “You’re going to fly in high tops?”

“Yeah, whatever, Malfoy, it’s the player, not the equipment.”

Malfoy cracked his neck obnoxiously. “The equipment tends to help.”

Harry grunted and gestured to the box. Malfoy flipped open the case, found the interior snaps holding the snitch, unclipped them, and held it in between two long fingers. 

“First to catch it wins?”

Harry nodded, focusing his mind on the golden shimmer. 

Malfoy released his fingers and the snitch flew away.

Into the fog. 

Great. 

Without waiting for Malfoy, Harry kicked off. The first swoop was fantastic. It was futile to seek the snitch in the thick grey fog. Harry tried out some upside-down moves. God, he hadn’t flown since the summer, and his muscles ached already. They’d been flying for maybe two minutes. 

He couldn’t see or hear Malfoy. The fog dampened all his senses. 

He’d have to wait for the snitch to come to him. Which, statistically speaking, was unlikely. 

“Oi, Malfoy!” he yelled into the clouds.

After a minute, Malfoy appeared out of the greyness. “Do you want to quit already?”

“What, no?” Harry said. “Watch this.”

He urged his broom higher and then went into a spinning nose dive he’d perfected during lazy summer Quidditch matches at the Burrow. Malfoy flew down beside him (quite a bit slower, obviously). 

“Can you do that?” 

Malfoy rolled his eyes. “Really? Your facile distractions won’t prevent me from winning, Potter.”

“Wait, wait,” Harry said, beckoning him closer. Now that they were closer to the ground he could attempt broom-surfing. 

He flew a bit closer and stayed just out of arm’s reach.

“Now watch this.” 

Harry narrowed his mind and hopped to his feet, crouching on his broom and extending his arms. 

“Potter, really,” Malfoy scoffed. “What is this, broom-borne yoga amateur hour?”

“You can’t do it.” “Right.” There was a steely set to Malfoy’s mouth. 

Without any word of warning, Malfoy tilted to one side and fell off his broom, but before he could fall, he caught it with one hand. Harry, shocked into clutching his broom again, watched as Malfoy grabbed it with his other hand.

His leather shirt rode up a bit. Malfoy had abs, apparently. 

And one of those fucking v-lines, apparently. 

Harry couldn’t move his eyes, apparently. 

Malfoy’s abs were cursed. That was the only rational explanation. Some elder gay wizard had indoctrinated him into a dark magic that glued men’s eyes to his torso. That was it. Yep. A dreadful ab curse.

(In the meantime, Malfoy had grabbed his broom with both hands.)

He started swinging back and forth, then somehow lifted himself up onto his broom. Then he was throwing himself forwards, spinning around his broom (how was this even possible, fuck, his shirt had ridden up), and now he was doing fucking pull ups (he had arms, too? Large arms?), panting out, “Is that enough for you, Potter?” before hanging upside down with his shirt hanging in his face. Harry was clinging to his broom, trying to keep his breathing steady. Just a bit of collegial exercise. Nothing to get too excited about. 

And then he saw the snitch.

Just a tiny flash of gold near Malfoy’s abs. 

Well, fuck. 

Clinging to his broom, half on and half off, he darted forwards with his hand out, but as his fingers closed around the snitch, Malfoy’s hand closed around his. 

They both froze.

Malfoy was breathing heavily (not that fit, Harry thought childishly and inaccurately), and he tensed his abs while craning his neck up to look at Harry. 

Harry couldn’t breathe at all.

“Think I’ve won, Potter.”

Harry was trapped. 

But he wasn’t going to let go of the snitch. 

“I’ve won, Malfoy, you git. I’m holding the snitch.”

“I’m holding you, though, so—”

“I have my fucking hand around the snitch.”

Malfoy hummed again, and let gravity do his work for him. God, his fucking—

Harry wasn’t going to lose that easily. 

He wasn’t distracted by cursed abs. 

Tightening his fingers around the snitch, Harry urged his broom downwards. Malfoy was almost jerked off his broom, but he clung to Harry with one hand and his broom with the other. 

Harry refused to let go of the snitch and crashed into the ground. However, this brought Malfoy down on top of him.

Malfoy was fucking heavy. And he was panting. 

Harry tried to shove him off with his free hand, but then Malfoy was sitting on top of him, trapping his torso between (my God) extremely strong thighs. 

This was very collegial. 

Very friendly, really. A friendly match between school chums. 

“Give off, Malfoy,” Harry said. He could barely see out of his fogged glasses. “I’ve won! You haven’t even touched the snitch. We’re on the ground and I have the snitch. I won.”

Malfoy hummed and tightened his thighs. 

Harry started seeing black spots swimming across his vision, and then Malfoy’s breathing sounded very far away, and then it was just black. 

When he came to, Malfoy was kneeling next to his head, with one hand on his forehead. Harry still had the snitch in a death grip. 

“Fuck, Potter, don’t scare me like that!”

“What happened?”

“You fucking fainted.” 

Harry blinked a few times. “You were crushing me with your muscular thighs!”

Malfoy looked taken aback. “Crushing you? Muscular thighs?” He blushed. “Barely, Potter, I tackled you.” 

Harry held up one finger. “There was crushing involved. Why else would I have passed out?”

Malfoy rolled his eyes and mumbled something that sounded like “ineffectual repression.” 

Harry chose to ignore that and held up the snitch.

“I’ve definitely won this one.” 

Malfoy sat back on his heels. “Fine, Potter, you can have this one. Charity point.”

Harry struggled to sit up, but Malfoy pushed him back down with one finger. 

“Shush, Potter, I’ll levitate you back to the tower. You’re not getting up until you’ve had tea and some toast.”

Harry opened his mouth to argue but when he saw the set of Malfoy’s mouth, he collapsed back into the wet grass. 

Twenty minutes later, he was tucked into bed, with Kreacher and Winky flurrying about him and a Malfoy draped across his armchair. 

“He’s just a bit weak,” Malfoy said. “Not used to exercise.”

Harry opened his mouth and Kreacher shoved a thermometer inside, shaking his head with a dour look. “Mr. Potter is not allowed to be unwell,” he said sternly. “Who will I bother when you are dead?”

It was fine. This was all fine. Harry James Potter, aged twenty-six, war hero, former Horcrux, survived Voldemort just to be killed by Malfoy’s thighs. He flopped back onto the pillow and closed his eyes. 

When he woke up, Malfoy was still in his armchair with his nose in a book. 

“Your glasses are on the bedside table,” Malfoy said before Harry could even open his mouth. “Which is where they should always be, if they’re not on your face.” He didn’t look up from his book but pursed his lips. “No wonder they’re always a bit crooked, since you thrash about in bed with them on.”

“I do not!” 

“Potter, I saw it happen.”

Harry broke out in a sweat. Had he had a nightmare? 

“I’m fine,” he said quickly. 

Malfoy hummed noncommittally and turned the page. Wait, was that _Murder on the Orient Express_? He’d been halfway through it. Had Malfoy taken his bookmark out? 

No, Malfoy had just gotten to the page with the bookmark. He paused for a moment. And then he started reading out loud from the exact paragraph Harry had left off on. Leaning back into the pillows, Harry wondered what his sixteen-year-old self would say about this—tucked up in bed with Draco Malfoy reading Agatha Christie at him as fog pressed in on the windows. 

It wasn’t half-bad. 

Actually, it wasn’t bad at all. 

Maybe, it was even good?

Maybe. 


	10. Mysteries and Plans

Since that day, Malfoy bothered him for Muggle murder mysteries. “I don’t know where to get them,” he’d insist, clinging to Harry’s latest Scandinavian blockbuster. He laid in wait for Harry to finish the books, and would pop into Harry’s classroom between lessons, or come knocking at Harry’s door in the evenings. “You’ve had it for ages,” he’d wheedle. 

“I’m not done yet!” Harry would say. He’d taken to hiding the books inside pedagogical covers. Of course, Malfoy would devour a book in a single sitting. It made Harry feel slow, plodding through books in days rather than hours. But he wasn’t slow. At least Malfoy couldn’t do any kind of maths. Addie had told Padma who’d told Harry that Malfoy marked everything out of tens just so he wouldn’t have to do complicated fractions. Harry started giving everything odd amounts of points, just to keep his students on their toes. That was the only reason. Not showing off how quickly he could add when he and Malfoy sat in the staff room grading late into the night. Not at all about that. 

“Aren’t you going to Ron and Hermione’s soon? I’m sure you could borrow some of her books, and she probably wouldn’t even notice,” Malfoy would say, looking up at Harry through his lashes.

Harry would grind his teeth. How could Malfoy turn everything into some annoying contest? 

It was the second week of December, and they were supposed to be taking names of students who wanted to stay at Hogwarts over Christmas. God knows why but Minerva had tasked the two of them to sit in the Great Hall (seniority, she would have responded) all Saturday and gather names. Harry had brought a stack of papers to mark, but Malfoy wouldn’t shut up about when the newest Tana French was going to come out.

“They put the first chapter at the end of her last one,” Malfoy said. “You probably didn’t even notice it.” 

Harry rolled his eyes and kept marking. You’d think seventh years would know your and you’re, but apparently not. He circled another grammatical error and put the end of his red pen back in his mouth.

Malfoy gagged. “I don’t see how you can chew on pens, Potter, it’s disgusting.”

“Don’t you have anything to do?”

“Unlike you, it doesn’t take me ages to mark things.” Malfoy shrugged. “Natural intelligence, I suppose.”

Harry ground his teeth. No students had come for a good forty minutes, and he was just about to strangle Malfoy. 

“Don’t you have to, you know, write one of your fancy papers or a book or something?” 

Malfoy looked taken aback. “Potter, if you think I could concentrate while sitting in the Great Hall, next to you, no less—” he broke off and looked down at his cup of tea. “I need silence. Absolute silence. And about five hundred books. And a fresh cup of Earl Grey. I couldn’t even consider starting an article in these circumstances.” He waved his hands around a bit. 

Harry made a face. 

There was a brief silence, and then Malfoy piped up again with some other nagging criticism about Harry’s red pen, and Harry gave up. He’d just sit here with Malfoy needling him all day doing absolutely nothing. That was fine. It was fine. Getting nothing done. Fine. But he didn’t have to just sit there and take it, so he went on the offensive. 

“What are you doing for Christmas, then? Malfoy Manor, big party, dye the peacocks green and red?”

Malfoy’s face shuttered. 

“I’m actually staying here, Potter.” He looked down at the list of students’ names. “The Manor was confiscated as part of our reparations.” A pause. “I haven’t been there in years. I think it’s a sanatorium now, or something.” 

Ah, shit, Harry’d put his foot in it again.

“Your mum, though?”

“She doesn’t want to come back from Paris this year.” He sounded so forlorn that Harry almost felt bad for him. 

Malfoy shook himself and asked what Harry was doing.

“Oh,” he said. “I’m not sure.” He blinked. He’d always done the Weasley’s for Christmas Eve and Andromeda and Teddy for Christmas morning. Why hadn’t he just said that?

“Maybe I’ll stay around for a bit.” 

Malfoy didn’t look up at him. “That would be nice,” he said at last.

Harry had a pang in his stomach. Too much black pudding at breakfast. 

And then before he knew what he was saying, he was offering, “You could come to Andromeda and Teddy’s with me on Christmas morning? We’d come back here for dinner, but you’re related to them, and I’m sure Andromeda wouldn’t mind another mouth to feed.”

Malfoy looked up at Harry. He didn’t say anything but nodded, with a small, private smile gracing his face. 

“It’s not fancy,” Harry said sternly. “I bring a bottle of plonk and we have crêpes and Teddy always has too much sugar and ends up crashing by eleven. There are tears. And you’d have to get him presents. But not the ones I’m getting him.”

Malfoy nodded seriously. 

“We could, you know, go shopping together,” Harry found himself saying. “So we don’t get the same things. For Teddy. We could go down to London or something and do a magical and Muggle shop—I always try to get him some of each—and God, we could get you to a Muggle bookstore so you’d shut up and stop bothering me about the Tana whatever her name is …”

Malfoy was nodding a lot, his eyebrows creased seriously. 

“I’m meant to go see Ron and Hermione this month, anyway, so we could just, like, combine those trips, I mean, if you wouldn’t mind staying on their couch or something—”

Malfoy gasped a little. Harry stopped.

“Potter, don’t you think you should ask them first? Before inviting—” he gestured to himself, “a former Death Eater to their home?”

Harry shrugged. Yeah, maybe he should have. But it was going to happen now; he could feel it in his stomach. It was the right thing to do. People weren’t supposed to be lonely on Christmas. Plus they couldn’t get Teddy the same things. That would be stupid and a waste of money and Teddy would be annoyed. (Teddy would not have been annoyed. He was a thoroughly unflappable child who didn’t care much about material objects beyond one ragged stuffed wolf he called ‘Lupy,’ and a framed portrait of his parents from the day he was born. But if Harry needed to think that, well, fine.)

“I’ll write them now,” he said. 

“You don’t have any paper,” Malfoy said with an arched eyebrow. 

“Ooh, wow, aren’t you a bright wizard,” Harry said mockingly, and accioed a piece of paper. “Look, now I’ve got paper.”

Malfoy huffed and turned back to the list of students. He was quieter for the rest of the afternoon, and even went off to the basements to fetch Harry a piece of treacle tart when his stomach started grumbling. It wasn’t half bad, Harry reflected, munching his treacle tart and watching Malfoy pompously tell snuffling Edward Bourne that Christmas at Hogwarts was much better than moping about in Australia with his father’s second family—they could go flying if the weather was good enough, and Malfoy would let him have the cracker prize, even if he didn’t win. Malfoy’s eyes lit up when he described the Christmas trees and the flaming pudding and then Edward wasn’t drippy anymore but looked a bit more cheerful while scratching his name down. 

“Alright, Bourne,” Malfoy said. “See you Monday for double period. Make sure you proofread your essay this time. Don’t distract from your good ideas with spelling errors.” Harry rolled his eyes but didn’t miss Bourne’s timid look of admiration. 


	11. A Visit to the Granger-Weasley Cottage

The weekend had gone off better than expected. He and Malfoy had flooed to London, spent far too many Galleons in Diagon Alley buying Teddy a slightly-larger children’s broomstick (Harry) and an animorph stuffed dragon (Draco; Harry rolled his eyes), then ate grim sandwiches at a Pret (Malfoy complained the whole time about the lack of mayonnaise, only he called it aioli and Harry wanted to barf), spent too much money at a Muggle toy store buying Teddy art supplies (Draco) and a wooden go-kart kit (Harry), and then wrapped up their day at a Waterstones, where Harry could barely see Draco behind a towering stack of contemporary murder mysteries (he refused all help carrying them, but then ducked into an alley and shrunk them, much to Harry’s relief). They’d gotten on a Muggle train, and then Hermione came and picked them up in a little red Clio.

Hermione spilled out of the car shouting Harry’s name. Malfoy gathered the bags and hung back, letting them hug each other. She studied Malfoy for a moment, then pulled him in for an embrace; he wasn’t expecting it and stood stock still, clutching their packages.

“God, I’m so sorry we’re not on the Floo yet. It’s been like eight months, but they always want to send the installation wizard during the week and we just don’t have time,” she groaned once they were all in the car. Malfoy was scrunched up in the back seat, but he didn’t say anything. 

“Ron didn’t want to leave the roast unattended,” she said, with a quick glance in the rearview mirror at Malfoy. “You know how he gets about basting.”

Harry laughed and updated her about their day. 

Ron and Hermione’s cottage was a ways outside the nearest small town. The protective wards shifted as she drove up the lane, shimmering in the dusk. Malfoy cleared his throat. Harry was sure he’d been a bit shocked to feel his intentions towards the Granger-Weasley’s magically probed. Ron’s magic had always been a bit overprotective. 

Harry’s glasses fogged up the minute he entered the kitchen, and then he was wrapped up in a bear hug from a beardy Ron, who stepped back, ruffled his hair affectionately, and spelled his glasses dry. 

Hermione herded Malfoy into the kitchen. 

He and Ron stared at each other for a few beats longer than socially acceptable. Hermione cleared her throat. 

Ron glanced at Harry, shrugged, and held out a hand. “Welcome to our home, Draco,” he said. Harry narrowed his eyes at Ron. First names already?

The roast was, of course, magnificent. Ron had spent the summer after eighth year at the Molly Weasley School of Cookery, and while he rarely had time during the week, his weekend dinners and brunches were the best British food Harry’d ever eaten, Hogwarts elves and Molly included. There were crispy potatoes (“Goose fat,” Ron insisted, serving Malfoy seconds), carrots and parsnips, buttery peas, fresh rolls, salty butter, good hearty ale (Harry had waited for Malfoy to wrinkle his nose and demand wine, but he complimented the beer twice. Twice.), and to round it off, treacle tart with fresh whipped cream. 

Harry groaned and leaned back. He wondered if he could discreetly unbutton his pants.

“God, Ron, if you ever want to give it up and open a restaurant—or just be my personal chef—” 

Ron rolled his eyes and scoffed. “Gotta get the baddies. Never-ending, apparently.”

Hermione sighed and twisted her wedding band. “One day, Ronald. When…” she trailed off and Harry raised his eyebrows. 

“Four more years, ‘Mione. Then we’ll do it.”

Malfoy shot Harry a confused look and Harry shrugged. He didn’t really know what they were on about, but if they wanted to do that weird couple speak, he wasn’t going to interfere. They’d tell him when—

“Kids,” Ron said. “Four more years, then kids.”

Harry lost his fucking mind with excitement. “God! YES!” 

Ron allowed Harry a few more shrieks of joy, and then pointed his fork at Hermione. “I mean, we know she’s got the better career and would lose her fucking mind at home, plus I hate desk work, and they kinda herd you in that direction when you’re nearing thirty, so, yeah, it’s perfect.”

“I didn’t want to ask but fuck YES!” Harry said gleefully. 

Hermione rolled her eyes. “Wish some people would stop asking,” she said under her breath. Ron mouthed “mum” and refilled her glass. 

Harry bounced in his seat. “God, I can’t wait. Granger-Weasley babies, God, it’s gonna be dope! You’re going to be amazing parents!” He couldn’t contain his excitement and started excitedly slapping Malfoy’s arm, then realized that Malfoy would find this irritating, and stopped. But Malfoy was just smiling at him and shaking his head. 

“Anyone would think you were pregnant, Potter,” he said without any venom. “You’re mental.”

Harry wiggled. His face hurt from smiling. “Granger-Weasley babies!”

“So,” Ron said with a smirk, “Hagrid wrote me. About the … demonstration. Of the dance.”

Harry groaned and put his head in his hands. “Can’t we go back to babies? Please?”

Malfoy poked him in the side. “You wouldn’t be a half-bad stripper, Potter.”

Hermione started giggling and Ron held his fist out to Malfoy, who looked confused, until Ron coached him into a fist bump. 

“You bring out something weird in him, that’s for sure,” Ron said. “He’s never even offered to give me a lap dance.”

“It wasn’t a lap dance!” Harry wailed. God, how were they all so chummy and against him? His oldest friends! Betrayal! Woe! He collapsed onto the table, hiding his blush in the crook of his arm. “It was a practical demonstration, since someone,” he raised his head to shoot a meaningful glance at Malfoy, “was trying to sink my wizarding DJ idea. They can’t have some old lame-o. They need pop music! Rap! Dance! House! At least something from this century!”

Malfoy shrugged and looked entirely unrepentant. “It’s so easy to wind you up. But I never really know what direction you’re going to shoot off in. Keeps me guessing.” 

Ron and Hermione were exchanging some coded looks but Harry decided to ignore that and ask for more tart. He deserved it. 

Hermione had put Malfoy in the guest room (“Unless you want to share,” she said with a shrug, to which Harry and Malfoy had not bothered to respond, unless you considered staring off in two separate directions and not saying anything for a good minute to be a response), so Harry was on the couch. While they were draping a sheet over the couch, she turned to Harry. Ron and Draco were off doing the dishes. It was just the two of them in the living room. The muffled sounds of water and clinking floated through the air. Harry knew this moment was coming. But he wasn’t looking forward to it.

Fixing him with her bright, sharp gaze, she said, “Malfoy’s gotten better. You know, he apologized to me when we were getting the luggage out of the boot. About the Mudblood thing. About lots of things, really. Ron and I weren’t sure about this, but we wanted to give him another chance. Because you seem to like him.” She paused in fluffing a pillow. 

Harry hummed. “I guess. He’s fine. He’s not a bad colleague.” 

“Which is why you’re having Christmas morning with him. And why he’s sleeping over at our house. And why he’s been the subject of most of your recent letters.”

Harry, suddenly feeling very hot, tried to take his sweater off but ended up with it stuck somehow on his glasses. But he didn’t really want to leave his sweater cave, so he pretended he couldn’t understand what she was implying about him and Malfoy, and said in a muffled voice, “Yeah, it’s fine, he’s a friend, I guess.”

Hermione waited until he emerged from the sweater. She’d sat down on the arm of the sofa. 

“Harry,” she said. “Have you ever thought that there’s maybe … more? To your relationship?”

“What?” 

She made a frustrated noise and rubbed her temples. 

“Like, sixth year? You were obsessed with him?” 

“He was planning to kill Dumbledore! I was watching him! For evil behavior! He was a wizard fascist!”

“Yeah, and you stalked him. All year. That wasn’t entirely necessary.”

“It was!”

“You didn’t sleep sometimes! You’d just watch his dot on the map! When he was in his dormitory!”

“I don’t think that means—” Harry broke off because he wasn’t really sure what it meant. Just better to not say anything, maybe. 

Hermione put her hands together in a praying gesture and bowed her head for a moment. Harry watched the wide circle of her afro sway as she took several deep breaths. 

“Have you read his book?” she said at last.

“What? No. One, I haven’t had time, and two, I’m not sure if I want to hear about Malfoy’s tragic past, especially since so much of it involved trying to actively or passively kill me—”

“Harry.” Hermione locked eyes with him. “I really think you should read it.”

Harry huffed. “Fine, maybe, whatever.”

She got up and went to the bookshelf. “I think I have a copy somewhere.” She grabbed a thick grey paperback and threw it at him. Harry caught it and turned it over. The cover was pale grey without a picture, just the title: _From the Blackshirts to the Death Eaters: Magical and Non-Magical Fascism in Britain, 1923-1998_. Draco Malfoy was written below in block capitals. It was about five hundred pages and weighed almost a stone. Harry flipped it open, saw the miniscule font and a table with numbers in it, and shut it immediately. 

“Can I take this? I’ll read it later.” He was not going to read this book. 

Hermione rolled her eyes, sighed, and kissed him on the head. “Just promise me you’ll read the foreword,” she said on her way out. “It might clarify some things.”

Harry was a bit peeved. First Padma, now Hermione. How good was this bloody foreword? Words didn’t mean anything. They could get twisted around and were so often hollow. It was all about what people did. Not what people wrote. Brushing his teeth fiercely, he seethed at the mirror. Sure, Malfoy wasn’t a bad person anymore. Ok, we were there. That thought was fine. But he was still an annoying and poncy git who—well, maybe that was harsh—he was at least a highly grating person with an overly fastidious mind and a penchant for dog-earing Harry’s novels. He wasn’t evil. Nowadays, he wasn’t even bad. He was just irritating. 

Harry spat and rinsed his mouth. He put his toothbrush next to the sink and looked at himself in the mirror. 

He had a sudden flashback to finding Malfoy in the bathroom, sobbing into the sink. He’d been so pale then, and so skinny, and his whole frame had been wracked with his sobs. It had sounded like Malfoy was retching. And then Harry had—and then he’d used Sectumsempra, without even knowing—and then there was blood everywhere—and Harry had something in his eyes now and was blinking furiously. He wasn’t going to take his glasses off. That would be admitting he was crying. At himself. In Ron and Hermione’s bathroom. 

Because he had his students now, and they were as old as he and Malfoy had been, and he couldn’t imagine running into a bathroom and finding Justin or Britney sobbing their lungs out about having to kill Minerva but they just couldn’t bring themselves to do it and then having one of their peers absolutely shred them to pieces and leave them there—and fine. He was crying. That was fine. He’d just have to be silent. 

Harry took his glasses off and pressed his hands to his eyes. 

They were so young. 

They were just boys. 

Just like Molly had said. 

Boys with problems far too large for their ages. 

And Malfoy had made so many bad choices. But Harry had made some pretty awful ones too. 

And half the time, it felt like he’d only ended up on the right side of history through a combination of luck, sheer pigheadedness, and having spectacularly bad enemies—that is, the grace of having enemies who were mostly irredeemably evil. Voldemort, Umbridge, Lucius, Bellatrix had all been pure evil. 

But Snape, and Dumbledore, and now, Malfoy, now that he knew, they were all grey. Malfoy certainly darker than Dumbledore, but—Harry couldn’t stop a hiccup. 

There was a gentle knock on the door.

“Harry?” Malfoy said softly. “Are you ok? You’ve been in there a while.”

Harry nodded, and then realized that Malfoy couldn’t see through the door, and gulped out an affirmative noise.

“Do you need me to get Hermione or Ron?”

“No,” Harry blurted. “No.”

There was a momentary silence. Harry blinked at himself in the mirror. 

They were just kids. 

And now they weren’t kids. 

And Malfoy was in Ron and Hermione’s house, waiting outside the hall bathroom, to see if Harry was having massive diarrhea or something. But instead Harry was just crying. 

“No, I’m fine,” Harry said at last, a bit unsure if Malfoy was still there. His voice was still a bit wobbly. “Just got into one of these loo books.” 

“Right,” Malfoy said finally. “If you’re sure you’re fine—” he paused, but Harry didn’t make a noise—“I do also have to use this bathroom and would like to go to bed sometime in the next twenty minutes, so …” 

Harry rolled his eyes at the door, finished his ablutions (he didn’t look that splotchy, and he didn’t run into Malfoy on the way back to the living room, so no one was the wiser), tucked himself into the sofa, and had the best sleep he’d had in months. 

* * *

Late Sunday afternoon, stuffed with Ron’s French toast and locally-sourced bacon, Harry and Malfoy stumbled out of the Floo in the staff room at Hogwarts. Padma looked up from her marking and said, “Nice romantic weekend away, boys?” to which Harry scoffed. 

Malfoy had dropped one of his packages, so Harry levitated it back into his arms. 

“It was lovely,” Malfoy said. “Ron and Hermione are wonderful hosts. And their cottage is beautiful.” There was a dreaminess to his voice that made Harry feel rather odd. Not ill-odd, just a bit disjointed. Like the world was a bit softer, but also somehow brighter? 

And then Malfoy continued in a more demanding tone, “Potter, you’ve got to give me their Muggle address so I can write them a proper thank you note. Ron was saying he loves getting mail in that little box near the end of the lane.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Harry wasn’t about to admit that he didn’t know that about Ron nor did he know their Muggle address. He’d have to send a quick thank-you-and-please-help-me-get-one-over-Malfoy-before-he-realizes-I’m-an-idiot owl now. And they’d just gotten back. Christ, was Malfoy always going to be like this?

Padma watched the two of them over her steaming cup of tea and hummed to herself. Things were coming along marvelously. She was going to have fifteen Galleons before the new year, she was sure of it. 


	12. The Winter Ball

The weeks leading up to the Winter Ball had loosed a frenzied storm of dating among the fourth-years and up—no one wanted to go to the Ball alone, even though Harry had started sprinkling his lessons with the joys of singledom and how it was much better to go with friends than to latch onto the nearest warm body—and Harry was getting rather frantic himself about the rising misery of his kids. He started wishing they didn’t even have a damn winter dance and began hinting to Minerva that it was causing them too much anxiety. He wilted under her glare and her acerbic reminiscence that he’d already booked the DJ and unless he was personally willing to refund two hundred Galleons to MC Hippogriff, and inform all the students that he, Harry James Potter, was the driving force behind its cancellation (he didn’t even dare to imagine the painful revenge Britney would wreak), the Winter Ball was going ahead as planned. 

At the end of a double period, Perry had been slow to pack up his books. Harry casually pretended he was seriously considering the books on the shelf near Perry’s desk. 

“Alright, Perry?” 

Perry stared at him and blinked. It seemed as though he were seeing Harry for the first time. Harry fought an urge to snap in his face. 

“Oh,” said Perry slowly. “I see.”

“See what?”

There was a long pause. 

“Perry, are you on drugs?” Harry hadn’t wanted to confront anyone about drugs ever; that wasn’t his job, really, even if they did talk about the American program D.A.R.E. and the sociopolitical implications of the crack cocaine epidemic. 

Perry shook his head emphatically, fringe flying out. He was attempting a Bieber, but he had such curly, pale hair that he looked a bit more like a cherub. 

“You’re happier now, sir,” Perry said. He’d put all his books in his bag. “You’ve just got a better vibe.”

Harry held back a retort. He’d always had a good vibe in the classroom. Always. 

“How are you doing?” he said, in an attempt to refocus the conversation. 

Perry scratched his head. “I think I’m fine, sir?” 

Harry waited, leaning back against one of the student desks. 

“You’re bi, right?”

“Yes,” Harry said. This was more of what he’d been expecting. 

“How did you, like, know?”

Harry paused. He wasn’t sure how personal to get. He couldn’t just straight up say he woke up from too many erotic dreams about men to be straight, but knew he wasn’t entirely gay because boobs were great, duh? He settled on, “I sort of always suspected I wasn’t straight, but I had some experiences as a teenager that made me certain I was attracted to more than one gender. Or, all genders. Whatever. I’m not particular.”

Perry tilted his head to one side. 

“You know, you’re always welcome at WAWFAN meetings, if you want to talk about it with someone your own age. There’s no need to decide on a label immediately, or ever—it’s ok to not be sure. It’s also ok to change labels. It’s all ok, Perry.”

Perry hummed and shook his angelic head. “It just seems stupid to be attracted to only one gender.” 

Harry laughed. He wasn’t expecting that. 

“It does, sir! How can you even like someone until you know them, like, really know them, and that doesn’t really have anything to do with what bits they have or whatever!” Perry seemed a bit outraged.

“And what’s worse,” he continued, “is that sometimes you really like someone, and you don’t even know if you’d have the wrong bits that they wouldn’t like or something, because like people don’t go around wearing labels and some people are really only into one kind of bits and it’s stupid!”

Harry reached out and patted his shoulder. 

“Perry, it’s ok. I’d recommend talking to the person. Just ask them.”

He’d almost slipped and said, ‘just ask him,’ but he saved himself. He shouldn’t assume. But it was Justin. It was totally Justin. 

“You don’t know what they’ll say until you ask.” 

Perry nodded a few times. “Thanks, sir.”

He was just slipping out the door when Malfoy swanned in, midnight blue robes swishing behind him. 

“Sweet, Potter,” Malfoy said, nodding at the space where Perry had been. “You’re very reassuring.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Harry said, waving his wand to close the door. “How long were you listening?” Malfoy shrugged and meandered towards the poster boards. Tracing one finger over a line of glitter glue (somehow a complete disaster and an inspired godsend for his first years; it kept them entertained for hours) surrounding a handwritten biography of the Queen, he said, “It’s complete madness now that they’re all wound up about the Ball. And it’s all your fault, given that the fever pitch of sexual repression doesn’t even have the dampening effects of a Celestina Warbeck or a string quartet playing waltzes.” 

Malfoy turned around with a wicked look in his eye. 

“Hope you’ve been practicing Ebublio, Potter.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Harry said weakly. He’d completely spaced. He wasn’t even sure they’d learned Ebublio in school. 

“Anyway,” said Malfoy, his eyes back on the bulletin board, “I’ve come to make sure you have an appropriate set of dress robes.”

Harry raised his eyebrows. “Charity does begin at home.”

Malfoy tutted and said, “Since your sense of fashion seems to be permanently stuck in some kind of teenage grunge phase, I just thought I could offer my services.”

A pause.

“As a fashionable wizard.”

“Mhm,” Harry said. “I’m completely sorted, thanks, though.”

He was, in fact, sorted. Shockingly. Five days later Malfoy would find out exactly how shockingly sorted and appropriately attired Harry James Potter could be. 

The evening of the Winter Ball was crisp and clear. A soft white snow covered the Hogwarts grounds. The students had been given Friday off after lunch, and the hallways were oddly silent in the hours leading up to the Ball. Harry’d done a bit of grading and then realized it was almost half-seven and sprinted to his room to get dressed.

He fiddled with the collar of his sherwani—it was a bit crooked somehow, maybe he’d wrinkled it—and rolled his eyes at the reflection in his bathroom mirror. 

“Why do you care about looking good, anyway, Potter?” he said to himself.

It was a school dance. With his students. 

Not that he’d be dancing with his students.

Not that he’d really be dancing. He was going to be there for chaperoning purposes, Ebublio at the tip of his wand.

Or something like that.

He rubbed some of Andre’s grandmother’s pomade on his hands and ran them through his hair, pulling up a few chunks while wiggling a bit to the Gorillaz song stuck in his head.

The last time he’d worn this sherwani was Ron and Hermione’s wedding. He’d thought black was a bit severe and an unlucky color for a wedding, but Ron had told him it would go with his tux (black tie, obviously, even if it was at the Burrow), and the gold would pick up their gold wedding rings when the three of them stood at the altar. He’d been best man and maid of honor, though those were outdated, sexist, and gender-normative terms. And he’d cried the whole ceremony. Ginny had snuck out of her seat in the front row to trade Hermione’s bouquet for a packet of tissues. For Harry. Who tried to be silent. But that just meant he couldn’t blow his nose and snot was running freely down his chin. Harry shook his head at the memory, a smile creeping up on his face. George had whispered some spell at him, and he found his eyes were dry. Dry-heaving it was. Molly was also sobbing, so he wasn’t completely alone. And Hermione didn’t cry (she couldn’t stop smiling), but Harry saw a tear run down Ron’s freckled cheek. They were his people. And they were in love. And they were going to be together forever. 

He couldn’t help it.

The gold trousers had gotten a bit tighter in the waist, thank God, he might be filling out a bit. 

One last look at himself in the mirror. He hoped this wasn’t too much. 

That he wouldn’t be too weird. 

No, fuck it, he was proud. 

He might be weird-looking and scarred and not really aware of wizard fashion, but Luna had said he looked amazing and it suited his aura, so, yeah. Fuck that. He was proud of being desi. Of being bi. Of having his dad’s unruly black hair and his mum’s luminous and short-sighted eyes. 

Yeah, fuck it.

He did finger guns at the mirror and headed downstairs. 

Turning around the corner, still humming the Gorillaz ‘Feeling Good Inc.,’ he smacked directly into someone who’d been lurking just around the corner.

“Oh, shit, sorry,” Harry yelped.

Malfoy leaned back from Harry’s chest, one hand on his cheek, “What the fuck are you wearing, Potter, armor?!”

Harry looked down at the metallic embroidery, which seemed to have dented Malfoy’s face. “Oh, yeah, well, Indians don’t mess about, like, so it’s real gold. Thought you’d appreciate that, Malfoy.”

Harry flicked his eyes back to Malfoy, who, still holding one hand to his face, was staring at him with wide grey eyes. 

“What are you wearing,” he whispered.

Harry wasn’t about to let that go without a long comment about sherwani and how it was an important part of his heritage, and launched into said long-winded, somewhat heated comment when Malfoy stumbled back against the wall. Harry reached out and grabbed his shoulder, “Hey, hey, what’s up?”

Malfoy was blushing and shaking his head. 

“Nothing,” he said.

Harry narrowed his eyes.

“Ok, fine, Potter,” Malfoy said and cleared his throat. “You, uh, look very nice.”

Harry closed his eyes. This was clearly a joke.

“You’re very …” Malfoy trailed off. Was he shaking? His shoulder was trembling slightly under Harry’s hand. “Handsome,” he said almost silently. 

Harry whipped his hand away from Malfoy. This was definitely a joke. But maybe it wasn’t? But maybe it was? Malfoy seemed to have gotten ahold of himself a bit and cleared his throat again. He was determinedly staring right at Harry’s chest. That sort of implied it wasn’t a joke, right? 

“Well, ta,” Harry said and wanted to kick himself in the face. Honestly, this “ta” business was getting out of control.

He’d heard you were supposed to compliment people back. But then suddenly all he could think of were ridiculous things like, _he’s quite cute when he blushes, _or _he’s got rather broad shoulders and an arse that’s quite nice, _or _his eyes are a really nice color, _none of which were work-appropriate.

“It really suits you,” Malfoy said, looking miserable. 

Miserable, yeah, that’s how people giving compliments should look. What was wrong with Malfoy? Was he just taking the piss?

But Harry was trying to think of something to say that didn’t mention Malfoy’s abs, arse, or arms, none of which were visible at this moment, so citing them would imply that Harry had been considering said body part for a while, which was not, absolutely not, the vibe he wanted to give off to a colleague. Just because he was hot didn’t mean he deserved to be sexually harassed on the stairs outside his bedroom. Even if he did say Harry was handsome. That could be a work-appropriate comment. 

“I’m sorry,” Malfoy was saying, “I didn’t mean to be culturally insensitive about the—”

“Handsome,” Harry blurted.

Malfoy stopped talking. His eyes darted about the corridor. 

“You,” Harry said, poking a finger into Malfoy’s (well-muscled) shoulder. His robes were quite soft and a midnight blue. Definitely stretch velvet, the way they caressed his biceps and then Harry’s mouth was saying, “are very confusing and also you look nice, so there's that.”

They were centimeters away from each other.

Harry felt his world getting very small, closing in to just Malfoy’s tilted head and his slightly parted lips and— 

Then there was a giggle from somewhere up the stairs and they sprung apart, Harry’s hands locking themselves behind his back. 

He was such a fucking idiot, _“you are very confusing, and you also look nice,”_ what did that even mean?! He sounded like a right berk. Malfoy seemed a bit confused as well, and maybe he had a cold, because he kept clearing his throat and he seemed a bit red. 

Addie clattered down the stairs, one arm around Padma’s waist. They were both flushed and giggling, and Padma gave Addie a kiss on the cheek as they separated. 

“What are you doing lurking about in hallways?” Padma said, a bit more slowly than usual. Ah, they’d been drinking.

“Nothing,” Malfoy said airily and while staring at the ceiling. “I was just exiting my room when Potter crashed into me. It’s nothing. A coincidence. Sheer chance. Combined with Potter’s inability to look where he’s going. Blind as a bat that one, completely and utterly—” he broke off and looked a bit abashed. 

Harry was still stuck on his terrible compliment. _You look nice, honestly, was he seventy-four? It sounded like something you’d say to a cat. Or a plant. Or a biscuit. Biscuits were nice. Malfoy didn’t look nice. He looked stunning. Ethereal. More handsome than anyone who could breathe should have a right to look. Like, proper old oil painting hot. Like one of those marble statues with a seventy-five pack of abs. Like, tooth-grindingly and irritatingly attractive. _

Addie raised her eyebrows. “Cozy,” she said at last with a sidelong glance at Padma. “Well, can’t be late!”

They arrived at the Great Hall just as the doors were opening, so they got to shoo the suddenly-hesitant students inside. Cue gasps of delight as they saw huge gold chains spanning the ceiling. _Please let it be leprechaun gold,_ Harry prayed, _or Britney has completely overshot the budget_. Gold and green glitter sprinkled down on the entrants, and the fairy lights wrapped around the chains somehow gave what should have been a gaudy catastrophe a classy and gentle effect. Harry suddenly remembered that the Ball was hip-hop themed.

Harry blinked a bit of glitter out of his eye and slouched off to find a glass of punch. His mouth had been dry since the Malfoy incident. God, why was he so weird around Malfoy lately? He was always putting his foot in his mouth or being accusatory or just … plain strange. 

Ooh, there was prawn cocktail! 

He spent the next twenty minutes cramming more shrimp than was polite into his mouth. 

Britney swanned up, her blonde hair rolled into crunchy curls. She kept darting glances at Elspeth, who was clinging to her arm and looked terrified at the punchy beat of T.I.’s ‘Bring Em Out’ booming through the space. Elspeth was wearing some kind of robes-with-mandarin-collar outfit embroidered with phoenixes that Harry could only assume was the Traditional Formal Pureblood Wizarding Attire in Hong Kong. Malfoy would know. Irritation surged through him.

“Doesn’t it look ace?” Britney shouted at him across the prawn bowl. She grabbed a prawn, downed it, slid the tail onto one of Harry’s several plates, licked her lips clean, pulled out a lip gloss, reapplied and pursed her lips at Elspeth, who clearly had been briefed on lip gloss duty and nodded seriously. “You look good, Professor!” Britney shouted. “Love the kit.”

Harry nodded. He could barely hear his own thoughts. 

“Having fun?” he yelled back, mostly to Elspeth. 

“Hands in the air!” Britney shrieked suddenly, throwing her arms up. Elspeth followed a beat behind, looking supremely unsure about the entire thing. 

In the moment of silence between songs, Elspeth wriggled a bit and said, “Britney, what’s he bringing out? I don’t understand—”

Britney shook her head and smiled fondly at her. “It’s a metaphor; we reviewed this, and the most common euphemisms, like lollipops are—” The introductory beat of ‘1, 2 Step’ saved Harry from hearing the rest of that sentence as she screamed with joy and dragged Elspeth to the dancefloor. Elspeth was trying to copy Britney’s moves. Trying so hard. It was precious. Britney put her hands on Elspeth’s hips to try to establish a rhythm, but the minute she took them away, Elspeth was back to irregular jolting. Harry felt a surge of protectiveness. 

“Amusing yourself with the buffet?” 

“Prawns,” Harry said, distracted by Malfoy’s sudden appearance.

Malfoy made some kind of noise (disapproving, Harry assumed), and looked down at Harry’s chest again. Then he reached out and removed a prawn tail from where it had been caught by the embroidery. His mouth was attempting severity and disgust, but his eyes crinkled. 

“Prawn shelf,” Harry yelled. “For later.”

“Potter, you’d already eaten it, unless you’re going for the extra keratin.”

“Gotta get swole?” Harry tried.

Malfoy looked him up and down—a bit longer than professionally necessary—and rolled his eyes. 

Then the beat of Akon’s ‘Smack That’ filled the air and Malfoy turned beet red. He hustled away from Harry and fell upon on two unsuspecting Hufflepuffs who’d gotten a bit too grindy, hitting them with a quick bubble spell. Malfoy’s neck was bright red. 

Harry ate a few more prawns, but they weren’t as appealing as before. 

The rhythm of ‘Walk It Out’ had Harry bouncing around on the side of the dancefloor. Justin exchanged a glance with Britney, and they were pulling him onto the dancefloor and cheering. Harry weakly attempted to protest. 

Then he saw Malfoy watching him while pretending to be entirely uninterested. 

And he decided, well, fuck it, and broke into an awkward rendition of the dance from Unk’s music video, which he’d shown in class a few weeks ago. Britney and Justin knew the backup dancers’ moves and rocked out besides him, drawing more and more of the student body into a dance circle. The fifth-year wizarding-born kids were trying to remember the moves they’d studied, and Harry did take a quick look around to see who’d been paying attention—Perry and Elspeth—though neither of them had any sense of rhythm and Perry gave up and began jumping up and down while shouting the lyrics—but Shuo had picked up the moves immediately and was twerking like there was no tomorrow. 

And then ‘Buttons’ started playing and Harry made a quick exit to stage left. 

Padma punched him in the arm and laughed. “Good job, Potter. Between the sherwani and the dancing, you’re doing a good job of giving Malfoy an absolute coronary. I’ve never seen him this red and twitchy.”

“Yeah, right,” Harry yelled back a bit nonsensically. 

Harry found himself back at the prawn bowl. It wasn’t even a bit lower. That was a challenge. And there was a new kind of sauce. 

Between ‘Dirty Little Secret’ and ‘Hey There Delilah,’ Malfoy appeared at Harry’s side. 

“It’s not that bad,” Malfoy said at last. “I’ve only had to Ebublio one couple.”

“And even that was a bit much.” Harry washed down a prawn with a swig of non-alcoholic butterbeer. “They weren’t even really grinding. Just sort of pre-groping.”

Malfoy straightened his sleeves. “I hardly think pre-groping is appropriate at a school dance.” He cleared his throat. God, maybe he _was_ ill, Harry thought. “I saw you dancing.”

Harry shrugged and reached for another prawn. “Britney and Justin wanted me to, and we watched the music video in class. I had to get it on a DVD, believe it or not. God, I wish I could get the internet to work here, that would be so much easier, like, the things I had to do to that DVD player to get it to work ...”

He fell silent as he watched Filius try to break it down to ‘Pon de Replay.’ Audrey was bouncing along and clapping, her bottle green hat askew. His eyes flicked to a nearby table, where Claude Oliver-Winger was banging his head directly onto the wood. Wait, Claude? He wasn’t a fourth-year. Whatever, his mum could deal with that. 

“I don’t think I could dance to Muggle music,” Malfoy said with his eyebrows raised. “There’s so much jumping.” He shuddered dramatically.

“It’s not all fast,” Harry said with a shrug. “There’s slow songs too, like The Plain White Tees song they just played?” Malfoy blinked at him. “Wait, wait, this one’s slow!” 

Harry grabbed Malfoy’s arm as the opening lyrics of ‘Chasing Cars’—_we don’t need anything or anyone_—were accompanied by a wash of purple light. 

“May I?” Harry said and Malfoy nodded slowly. He pushed Malfoy’s hands up onto his own shoulders and grabbed what should be Malfoy’s waist (don’t think about the abs, don’t think about the abs) on both sides. 

He swayed slowly from side to side, widening his eyes at Malfoy and nodding to encourage him. Malfoy seemed a bit like a statue, but he mechanically began moving his feet. He had his eyes fixed on a point over Harry’s shoulder, but, like, Harry wasn’t complaining.

It was colleaguely to teach someone about a new culture. 

Malfoy was quite warm through his robes.

And quite solid.

_Forget what we’re told before we get too old, show me a garden that’s bursting into life, all that I am, all that I ever was, is here in your perfect eyes, they’re all I can see, I don’t know where, confused about how as well—_

Harry wanted to hold on forever. His hands tightened on Malfoy’s waist. 

He didn’t want to sit with that thought. And what that thought implied. And how Malfoy’s bottom lip was caught in his teeth, and the way his hair glowed in the soft purple light, and how his eyelashes were so clear and long. He was too fucking pretty, ok. It was enough to do anyone’s head in. 

He had to distance himself from this weird train of thought. He shouldn’t be feeling any kind of way one, about a colleague, and two, about Malfoy. Maybe if he stepped on Malfoy’s foot? Malfoy would be sure to be pissed off, and then it would be back to normal. So just as the final beats of the song played, Harry stepped down quite deliberately on Malfoy’s foot. Malfoy didn’t even curse, just winced a little. He seemed a bit far away.

Harry dropped his hands, stepped backwards, and folded his arms. Colleague. Professional. Dry toast. Cricket. Say something, you weirdo. 

“See, it’s like the waltz?”

“Potter, if that’s like a waltz, I am a drunk Erumpent.” But this lacked the crisp retort of a Malfoy insult, and he seemed a bit dreamy as he let go of Harry’s shoulders. 

Luckily they were back to the thumping beat of Eminem before Harry could consider how he’d just asked Malfoy to dance and danced to a slow dance with him and he’d thought about Malfoy’s eyelashes, which was definitely not on, so he’d just go over there and separate Justin and Perry (he knew it!) who were making out quite vigorously and rubbing against each other frantically (“Less action,” Harry barked, tapping Perry on the shoulder with his wand)—who had approved of this music?! He had. Right. This was being hoisted by his own petard. Well and truly hoisted.

He looked around for Malfoy, but the blond man seemed to have disappeared. 

The rest of the evening was markedly less exciting. There seemed to be some drama among the seventh-years, resolved when two crying girls turned on a Slytherin boy and gave him two fingers each before running onto the dancefloor to rock out to Missy Elliot. Britney was one of the last to leave, insisting that she had to help the elves clean up, but Minnie pushed her out the door with a firm, “Good night, Miss Smith” and a gentle shove into Elspeth’s waiting arms.

As he stepped out of his clothes, laying them across his chair, Harry paused and looked out the window. Snow was falling softly across the grounds. 

The thoughts were wriggling in his stomach. The Malfoy-related thoughts. Though there were no such thoughts. Those thoughts were completely out-of-bounds and therefore needed to be locked firmly away. In a box. Throw the key out the bloody window. Think about Hippogriffs. Or killing doxies. 

He took an anti-nausea potion (not for emotional distress, Potter, really), and tucked himself into bed, resolutely thinking about lesson plans for next term. 


	13. Christmas Eve and Christmas

The day after the Ball, the students left for the Christmas holidays and a blessed silence settled over the castle. Christmas Eve itself dawned grey and snowy. Harry spent the day fiddling with wrapping paper and wishing he could at least enchant things to be neat. They loved him and it wouldn’t matter, he told himself. 

Half-seven, Harry bustled into the Floo and was spit out at Burrow. Unshrinking his presents, he wedged them under the bristling Christmas tree. And then he joined the Weasley fray in the kitchen, slapping Charlie on the back to congratulate him about the birth of a new dragon litter, accepting a glass of eggnog from Ginny, receiving a thorough pecking from Molly, a two-sided bear hug from Ron and George, and a gentle shoulder-clapping from Arthur. Luna tucked a piece of holly into his collar. 

Harry couldn’t take his eyes off Percy. Molly hovered about him, fondling the arm of his sweater, kissing him on the cheek, turning his engagement ring hand round and round in the light and sending sparkling light across the kitchen ceiling—and she wouldn’t let go of Oliver. She had one hand constantly cupping his cheek or fetching him another little something, making sure he knew how welcome he was. Harry saw Percy and Oliver exchange a loving look over her head and Harry’s throat tightened. 

Angelina and Hermione were tucked into a corner, whispering about something. Hermione seemed unusually gleeful and kept touching Angelina’s arm and looking at George. Fleur, Bill, and Victoire were off in “Antarctica, of all places! How do they have curses to break at the South Pole?” Molly cried, pausing in her quest to find another tasty nibblet for Oliver. “That poor child is probably freezing to death and Christmas without the whole family!” She continued to mutter while turning back to Ollie and Percy.

“Probably gets more presents from the two of them than the rest of us,” George said in an undertone. “She’s got them wrapped around her finger. Me and Angie aren’t going to—” he broke off and gulped some lager.

Ron nudged Harry in the side and mouthed “preggers,” with a nod at Angelina. Harry fought the grin that threatened to burst out across his face. Like George, he buried himself in his drink. Luckily, that was when Andromeda and Teddy fell through the Floo, and from that moment on, Harry had his hands full with Teddy, who immediately morphed his hair to match Harry’s new style. 

The table literally groaned when they all wedged themselves around it. The conversation was quick and filled with loving jibes. Harry tried to let Teddy win the crackers, but they were drawn to his stronger magic and kept shooting glitter at him. Teddy got all the trinkets anyway. He stumbled through the terrible jokes, and then demanded everyone else’s as “practice, like my teacher said!” It helped that the Weasleys would roar at each terrible pun like they’d never heard it before.

They gathered around the tree and Teddy gave them each one present from under the tree. They all ripped theirs open at the same time, cuing a deafening chorus of thanks and admiring exclamations. 

Hours passed between boisterous carols, several boxes of chocolates, and lots of gossip. Teddy had face-planted on the carpet and was gently snoring when they realized it might be time to go home.

“See you tomorrow morning, Harry,” Andromeda whispered, levitating her somnolent grandson towards the Floo. “It’s lovely that you’ve asked Draco, too.” 

Seven ginger heads whipped towards Harry. Andromeda, blissfully unaware of the commotion she’d caused, stepped into the Floo with a gentle wave. Harry tried to edge off his seat, but George had his arm in a vice-like grip.

There was no getting away from it, he supposed, and gave up. 

Leaning back into the cushions, he waited until the deluge of questions—and Ron’s chanting “I knew it!” over and over—settled a bit and then he held up his hands.

“I know it’s a bit odd—”

“Odd!” Molly practically shrieked. “He’s a Death Eater, Harry!”

“Mum,” Ron groaned, “He’s not still a Death Eater!”

“He does seem to be reformed,” Hermione interjected. “He came around to ours last weekend? Two weekends ago? Anyway, he’s perfectly lovely, and he apologized to me—”

“And me,” Ron said. “When we were doing the dishes.”

Hermione shot Ron a Look and continued, “I think the war really changed him and if you’ve read his book—”

Percy leaned forward and rubbed his hands together. “Exactly, the book was all about forgiveness and the ability for people to change, which I think—"

George grunted and put his arm protectively around Angelia. “I think he’s a right shit, that’s what he is. No book changes that.”

Hermione and Ron rolled their eyes in sync. 

Harry groaned. “Look, first, he’s one of Teddy’s only living relations, and it’s really hard to grow up without anyone related to you, even if you’re kind of adopted by one of the best families in the world,” Molly looked mollified, “and two, I’ve been working with him for like six months and he hasn’t done one shit thing. Not one. Like, he’s still kind of an arse, but just in a normal, prickly, posh way. Not in like, an evil, fascist way.”

Arthur waited a moment, then said slowly, “He was just a boy, it’s true. Even if he could have made better choices.”

Molly looked a bit wobbly. “Harry was just a boy, too! They were all kids!” 

Arthur patted her knee. “I know, love, but maybe it’s time to work on forgiveness a bit. I’ve been reading about this muggle character called Jesus, you know, the one who inspired Christianity, and one of his mottos was ‘turn the other cheek,’ which, to be fair, I’m not entirely sure I understand the story, but the gist of it is that you’ve got to allow people a second chance to hit you. And then if they don’t hit you again, they’ve probably regretted hitting you the first time and you’ve shown you’re the better person anyway. Or something.” He patted at his cardigan pockets and took out a tiny orange New Testament, which he began flipping through while mumbling to himself. 

The silence grew.

But then the rest of the group began nodding and shrugging and breaking into separate conversations, Ron leaned towards Harry and whispered, “So, are the two of you together?”

“What?” Harry shot back, “what are you on about?”

Ron just smirked and leaned back. He put one muscled arm around Hermione and whispered into her hair. She smacked him in the side and shot an apologetic glance at Harry. 

Harry fiddled with a bit of wrapping paper that had fallen into his lap. They’d gotten more couple-y in the last six months and he knew it was because he was at Hogwarts and they were busy and they just hadn’t spent that much time together, but Harry wanted someone to whisper things to and put his arm around on the sofa and he suddenly felt a bit cross and pouty. It wasn’t anyone’s fault he was alone. Or that his ex was happily feeding her girlfriend bits of popcorn off the Christmas tree decorations (was that hygienic?). He just felt rather cross. And that wasn’t anybody’s fault. 

After another round of sherry, Harry said his goodnights and flooed back to Hogwarts. The remnants of the cross feeling prickled at the back of his eyes when he sat in his room, staring at the fire. He grabbed a wooly hat and his broom and kicked the big window open. A good flying session would clear his head.

And it did. He sped towards the Forbidden Forest. He could feel his nostrils freezing and wiggled his nose to delay the process. He should have worn a balaclava. Speeding along the tops of the trees, he filled his lungs with the frigid air. The pain felt fresh and somehow cleansing. 

He didn’t need anyone else, he knew that.

But he’d been alone for so much of his life. 

He really wanted someone else. 

Someone who’d come fly with him when his skin felt too small.

Someone who would push him to be a better person, friend, educator, godfather. 

Someone who’d want to have kids with him one day. 

Someone who’d be a good father or mother or parent.

He didn’t need them, no, but he sure as hell wanted them.

Shaking the tears from his eyes, Harry turned back towards the castle. He flew towards the unmarried professors’ tower—God, it needed a better name—and towards the light. As he drew up to the lit window, he realized it wasn’t his room. 

It was Malfoy’s.

He floated for a minute in the darkness, just beyond the reach of the light, watching Malfoy (in emerald pajamas, no less) putter around his quarters, turning down his duvet, sitting down on his bed, getting up again to go scratch something on a piece of parchment on his desk, then crossing the room again and curling into his bed. He watched Malfoy reach for a book and reach for the little stuffed snake, tucking it around his neck as he began to read. Harry watched his lips moving—why was he reading aloud? To the snake?—and felt a surge of warmth. 

Rubbish, he thought, and urged his broom upwards. But he felt better as he got into bed. Christmas was tomorrow. That made everything feel better. That and the flying. Nothing else. 

And then Harry overslept and woke to a firm knock on his door. 

Malfoy was yelling at him on the other side. Happy Christmas to me, Harry thought, and reached for his glasses. 

He scrambled to the door and opened it. Malfoy practically fell into the room, but didn’t pause in his irate gesticulations and verbal tirade. “Potter, we are going to be late, how can you be late, oh, Happy Christmas,” he said, holding out a small, wrapped present. “But you can’t open it now. You’ve got to wait until we’re at Andromeda’s, because I was going to give it to you before but now it’s practically nine and Teddy’s going to be absolutely exploding because I’m sure he woke up at five—”

Harry had been searching around for a nice jumper. He ripped off his pajamas—shutting Malfoy up effectively, he noted—and assembled a decently nice outfit. Of course, Malfoy was wearing a soft burgundy cashmere sweater, but we weren’t all made of money (or class, his brain added unheeded; Harry did have a vault filled with gold, but no inclination to acquire fine knitwear). But charcoal grey chinos and his latest Molly Weasley jumper (strangely in emerald wool) was passable. He gathered up his gifts for Teddy and Andromeda and beat Malfoy to the door. 

Malfoy was still standing in the middle of Harry’s room, determinedly staring out the window. 

“Ready, Malfoy?”

Malfoy made a harrumphing noise and brushed past Harry.

He didn’t speak as they made their way to the staff room. Malfoy threw a handful of Floo powder into the fireplace and held out his hand. 

Harry raised his eyebrows.

“It’s faster for two if you’re physically connected,” Malfoy said with a little huff. “It’s basic transportation magic, Potter.”

Harry fought down the heat that threatened to blossom in his stomach. 

“Fine, whatever,” he said, grabbing Malfoy’s wrist. Hands seemed too … much. Just too much. 

Even wrapping his fingers around Malfoy’s wrist—the right one, with the tattoos that Harry hadn’t seen—he was burning. With curiosity. To see Malfoy’s mystery ink. Not to feel Malfoy’s smooth skin and gentle cashmere under his palm.

“Wrexham Manor!” Harry yelled as they walked into the green fire. 

They had no sooner ducked out from Andromeda’s mantel than they were attacked by a burst of turquoise. 

“HARRY AND DRACO ARE HERE, DROMMY!” Teddy yelled, wrapping his arms around both of them. “THEY WERE HOLDING HANDS!”

Draco attempted to extricate himself.

“We weren’t holding hands,” he said with a little moue of distaste. “Harry and I are colleagues, as he has exquisitely reminded me on multiple occasions.” 

The latter sentence was drowned out, at least to Harry, by Teddy’s frantic yelling. He’d given up on Draco and was patting Harry down for hidden presents. 

Harry realized he was still holding Draco’s wrist and dropped it.

He pulled the shrunken presents out and told Teddy, “I’ll unshrink them once you’ve unwrapped them, otherwise you’ll know what they are immediately.” 

Yelling incoherently, Teddy collected his offerings from Malfoy as well and raced off to deposit them on the long dining room table. 

Malfoy was preoccupied with shaking the ash from his shoes. 

He was pulling his right sleeve down as though Harry’s fingers had burned him. 

Harry shook himself and went into the dining room. Andromeda had knocked out the maze of dark hallways that had dominated the Black home in Wales, and now the sitting room, complete with two-meter-tall fireplace, looked into an open-plan kitchen and dining room. She’d kept the dining table that seated fourteen (“You never know,” Andromeda had said once; Harry suspected she just liked having the space to cut fabric for her quilts) and it was set with a miniature white and gold forest, complete with miniature silver centaurs chasing nymphs through the trees, trees with sparkling gem leaves, and a miniature waterfall of Hollandaise sauce. 

The Black family had drama in its genes. 

“Good morning, boys,” Andromeda said, coming around the island to give them each a floury kiss on the cheek. “Sit, sit, I’m just cooking the final crêpes now. Elen was up all night with the jams and sauces—even though I told her she didn’t have to—and it’s just divine.” 

Elen, who waved off Andromeda’s praise while continuing to stir two different pots on the hob, was the particularly small elf who’d manned this estate’s kitchen for the past fifty years. Andromeda kept trying to pension her off, but she just kept popping around with a little tart for Teddy or a cream sauce for a steak, just if they were going to have one, until Andromeda rolled her eyes and let Elen rule the kitchen again. Elen had agreed to the building of a small cottage on the Wrexham Manor grounds so her grandchildren, whose parents were in service to a wizarding family in Cardiff, could come for bank holidays. Andromeda and Hermione didn’t think it was enough, but Teddy and Elen pitched fits every time the elderly elf’s departure was broached, however delicately. 

By the time the four of them sat down to breakfast, Elen had already slipped Harry two jam tarts and a chocolate éclair. Malfoy had received a cappuccino dusted with cinnamon. Harry still didn’t understand how elves seemed to be able to bend time and space in kitchens.

First came the savory course, buckwheat crêpes laden with smoked salmon, chives, and Hollandaise, accompanied by fresh espresso for the elders and peppermint hot chocolate for the under-twelves. Then there was the sweet smorgasbord, in which they spread, slathered, drizzled, filled, and then gorged themselves on sweet crêpes filled with every imaginable topping, from marshmallow crème and Nutella to Valrhona chocolate sauce and salted caramel to fresh strawberries and kiwi. It was amazing. 

Harry leaned back in his chair and groaned.

Malfoy quirked an eyebrow and shook his head at Harry.

Harry made sure that Teddy was engrossed in dripping butterscotch over a crêpe filled with rainbow sprinkles and peppermint humbugs before flipping Malfoy two fingers. Elen cackled and caused Teddy to look up in confusion. 

“It’s nothing, just love,” Elen said with a wicked smile, “Here, Teddy, add some crushed lemon drops.” She also had an odiously sweet tooth. Hermione had a pet theory that elf teeth were made of something stronger than human enamel, because they rarely needed dental work, but since this issue improved their lives instead of negatively impacting them, she’d sidelined that potential topic of research for the current moment and was focused on equal rights for elves. 

“Love,” Harry scoffed. “We’re coworkers and former arch-nemeses.” 

Andromeda and Malfoy huffed in the same tone and picked up their coffee cups, pinkies out. 

God, he always forgot they were related until shit like this happened.

The rest of the morning passed in a lazy haze. Teddy went absolutely bonkers for his _and_ Malfoy’s presents—which should have caused Harry to feel a bit jealous, but seeing how Malfoy’s smile changed from a bit worried to gentle and open set off a cascade of warmth—and zoomed around the ballroom on his tiny broomstick while his new stuffed dragon flapping its shiny wings and flew along beside him. 

“Are you doing that?” Harry said, nudging Malfoy. “I didn’t realize it could fly in the shop.” Malfoy looked at the ceiling.

Harry elbowed him again. 

He sighed. “I may have augmented its charmwork a bit,” he admitted. “Dragons shouldn’t be flightless.”

Strangely poetic, Harry mused, sipping his coffee and watching Teddy’s speedy circumambulation. 

“Do you think we should put some kind of cushioning charm down?” Harry said after Teddy had a close escape with a late Ming vase. 

“Honestly, Potter, I cushioned the entire ballroom the minute he grabbed your ridiculous little broom,” Malfoy huffed. He had his wand tucked behind one ear, and it reminded Harry a bit of Luna. If Luna were prickly and had a sharp jawline.

He hadn’t felt Malfoy’s magic at all. Maybe he was just used to it now? 

“Wait, wait, do a spell now,” Harry said, suddenly curious.

“What? Why?”

“I want to see what your magic feels like.”

Malfoy gave him an odd look, but complied, sending a patronus galloping across the room. Harry couldn’t see what it was, other than a large quadruped—Abraxan? Thestral? Unicorn? All three seemed fitting in different ways. 

Harry hummed, feeling the subtle shift in the air. Malfoy’s magic was much softer than it’d been as a teenager, which was to be expected, but Harry hadn’t realized how much his magical signature had mellowed. If Harry’s magic was a lightning blaze, crackling and fierce, Malfoy’s magic was like gentle waves or a slowly coursing river, slowly causing shifts in the fabric of space and time.

When he opened his eyes again, he realized he’d unwittingly cast a Patronus too.

Teddy was hovering on his broom in the middle of the ballroom, watching the two patronuses dance around each other. 

He reached one small hand out, and one of the glowing animals bowed its head and sniffed his pudgy fingers. 

Wait, were they the same animal?

No, he could see that one of them was smaller, like a doe—Harry was filled with dread. Snape’s patronus was a doe. Did Malfoy still admire him? 

He turned to Malfoy to ask, but Malfoy pushed his way out of the ballroom, and his Patronus dissolved into fluttering silver bits. 

Harry shook his head. He must be seeing things. He needed new glasses, that was it. 

Teddy flew up to him, grabbing his arm in a clumsy dismount, and gave Harry a long look. “You and Uncle Draco have the same Patronus species,” he said seriously. “Drommy told me that’s something that happens when you get married.” 

Out of the mouths of fucking babes, Harry thought, and clenched his jaw. “Well, Draco and I probably just like the same type of animals, Ted, so it’s probably not very meaningful, all in all. I’m sure your teachers have talked about coincidences and how not everything has some huge meaning, so …” Harry didn’t know where to go from there with that thought, so he just shut up.

Teddy gave him a suspicious look before whispering something to his new stuffed dragon and handing Harry his broom. They traipsed back down the hall towards the kitchen. 

“Draco said he had to go,” Andromeda said, a pinched look on her face. “He said he wasn’t feeling well.”

Harry started feeling a bit ill himself. That meant what Teddy said was true. It had to be true, otherwise—but—how—it was too strange to consider. It meant—no, he couldn’t—but then why—but why else would it have taken that form—and then why had he left? It didn’t have to mean something, he told himself, fighting the urge to run after Draco. 

Draco. He was Draco now, Harry realized. 

Well, fuck. 

“Probably too much salmon,” Harry said at last. 

Andromeda sighed. “He’s always had a nervous stomach, according to his mother.”

Teddy opened his mouth, took one look at Harry’s face, and shut it again.

They sat down to a game of charades, but Andromeda and Harry kept losing track of what they were supposed to be acting out and got thoroughly trounced by Elen and Ted. Harry didn’t know why Andromeda would be so worried about Draco—unless she was afraid that she and Elen had somehow poisoned him and they’d have to face the wrath of Narcissa—but he couldn’t stop thinking about the two glowing patronuses circling each other in the dark cavernous space of the ballroom. 

Eventually, Harry said his goodbyes and flooed back to Hogwarts. He went to his quarters. He left his presents in a pile on his desk. He went down to Draco’s door. He knocked. There was no response. Harry could feel a muffliato pushing against the door.

So. He didn’t want to be bothered. Well, Harry would respect that.

Except that he went back down twice more that afternoon and then three times before bed. 

His knocks went unanswered each time. 

He realized the fourth time that he’d forgotten to give Draco his Christmas present—the latest Tana French mystery—so the fifth time, he knocked, and left the wrapped tome outside Draco’s door when it became clear Draco wouldn’t answer.

Harry sat down on the edge of his bed, turning Draco’s present to him over and over in his hands. 

He nudged open the matte black paper and felt something solid drop into his hand. 

Turning it over in his fingers, Harry saw it was a silver cigarette case—a bit battered and dented and with a complicated family crest. _Toujours Pur,_ read the banner at the base of the shield.

Wait, that was the Black family motto. Harry’s hands stilled.

Then he was scrabbling with the paper to see if there was a note. 

Sure enough, in Draco’s spindly handwriting, he read: _Happy Christmas, Harry. This arrived at our house after Sirius was arrested; I’m not entirely sure it was his, but my mother can’t think of who else it might have belonged to. Let me know if you need help getting it to work. It’s a bit tetchy. x DM _

A tear blurred the green ink. 


	14. Manuscripts and Files

Harry didn’t see Draco for days. The elves told him that he was holed up in his room, “Writing, sir, lots of papers flying about,” and consuming large amounts of toast with Marmite. Harry could barely believe that Draco would eat Marmite, but he also knew that Kreacher had no incentive to drag Draco’s eating habits. 

He finally saw Draco at dinner in the Great Hall on New Year’s Eve. He seemed a bit paler than usual, but maybe it was just the voluminous ink-black robes he’d drawn tightly around himself. 

Harry tried to position himself so he’d sit next to Draco, but Bastian swept his housemate off towards the other end of the table and Harry was stuck next to Addie-and-Padma (who were very emphatically together now and were feeding each other the little caviar nibbles) on one side, and Minnie on the other, who just kept gesturing at Addie and Padma with her coupe of champagne and mumbling about young love and how it was all so much more open than it had been in her day. It all made Harry feel hot and cross, and he took a bottle of champagne to his room and passed out at half-eleven. 

He thought he heard a knock, but he might have been dreaming.

The next day brought the students back. Harry spent the day nursing a hangover and hiding in his classroom “organizing” for the start of term.

Draco turned up on Friday afternoon, his arms full of papers. 

“Here,” he said abruptly, dumping the pile on Harry’s desk. 

“What is this?” Harry said. He leaned forwards and read the first page. 

_The 143rd Staircase, _he read in spindly green ink.

“It’s a provisional title,” Draco said with a huff. 

“Wait—is this—” Harry began flipping through the pages. “Is this a novel?”

Draco pressed his lips together and shot a glance towards the window. “The wizarding world doesn’t seem to have any kind of mystery literature, probably because there are so many mysteries regarding magic and magical living anyway, but I just thought, well—”

He broke off and pressed his hands to his lips.

“It’s probably rubbish,” he said and reached for the manuscript.

“No!” Harry shouted, grabbing it and holding it to his chest. “Nope!”

“Really, I shouldn’t have—” Draco said with a weak attempt to snatch it back.

“No,” Harry said firmly, “You gave it to me and I get to read it now. It’s mine.”

Draco sounded half-resigned and half-pleased as he said, “Fine, alright, fine.”

He leaned back against one of the student desks. He didn’t seem like he was going to say anything regarding the whole Christmas Day Patronus Incident. Or really like he was going to say anything. Well, that was fine. Harry wasn’t going to bring it up then. 

Harry did crack first, though, and said, “Having a good 2007 so far?”

Draco shrugged. “I did write a novel in the first week, so that seems like a good start.” 

“I feel like I just got over my hangover from New Year’s,” Harry laughed. “You’re beating me, that’s for sure.” 

Harry felt the silence stretch out between them. He didn’t quite feel up to bringing up Sirius’s cigarette case; it was a bit too fresh to speak about without his eyes burning. He’d sent Draco an effusive thank you note. That was enough for now. 

He turned to the CD player and gave it a thump. “I was just listening to this band you might like,” Harry said. And then he remembered what they were called. “Here, listen,” he said, and skipped tracks to get to ‘Stacked Crooked.’

Draco listened—fuck, Harry had forgotten about the fingers in the mouth bit, that was a bit weird—and he closed his eyes and nodded along as the beat picked up. 

“Hm, not bad,” he said once the song was over. “What are they called?”

Harry coughed. 

“Uh, the New Pornographers?” 

“What?!” Draco said with a gasp. “Potter, you’re suggesting pornographic music to me?! Is that the soundtrack to a naughty Muggle film?!”

“Oh my God, no,” Harry moaned, dropping his head to the desk. “I knew you’d overreact like this. It’s just a raunchy band name.” He said all of this directly to the polished oak desk. 

“And you play this for your students?!”

“Oh my God.” Harry groaned. “Ok, no, I don’t play it for my students, and, even if I did, it’s not explicit content and most of these kids probably know what porn is anyway, like, I knew what porn was by the time I was fourteen and I lived in a cupboard and like, didn’t have a computer, so—”

Draco had gotten that tight, shut-in look to his face again. “Potter, I really think we should talk about this cupboard business, or you should talk to someone about it.”

Harry sighed. “I’ve been in therapy since I turned seventeen? Turns out there are wizarding therapists? And I have a muggle therapist, so, like, worked through the trauma of being raised by racist Brits already. But you, what about you, therapy?”

Draco pressed his lips together. 

“I—have tried,” he said slowly. “But I was afraid to see a witch or wizard because of the … sexuality issues our world is less quick to accept and seeing a muggle doesn’t really make sense.”

Harry knew he shouldn’t pry at that one, but he really couldn’t resist raising his eyebrows. 

“No, no, Potter, not like that! It’s just hard to explain that you used to be a wizard fascist because the divisions don’t exactly map onto muggle issues like racism or homophobia, so it all comes out kind of wrong when you’re trying to explain why you hated certain groups, and besides, I’m terrible at lying. And you’re not supposed to lie in therapy!” He held up his hands in supplication. “It’s not some leftover anti-muggle bias. Swear to Salazar.” 

“Fine,” Harry said, and pulled out a pad of sticky notes from his drawer. He scrawled a name, phone number, and address down and handed the note to Draco. “That’s my wizarding therapist. Her name’s Eileen. She’s from an old West Country wizarding family, so she probably knows all about your … uh, traditions.” 

“What is this little thing?” Draco said, completely unfazed by Harry’s strange word choice. “It sticks? But it’s not like, sticky?”

Harry stared at Draco. How could this man have written a book about muggle history and not know what a sticky note was?

Then again, he went to fancy libraries and studied old books.

They probably weren’t fans of the humble sticky note. 

“It’s called a sticky note,” Harry said and leaned forwards to show the block to him. “See, it’s like little notes that you can, well, stick onto things. The inventor was trying to come up with a super-strength glue, but he ended up making an adhesive that doesn’t leave marks on things. So, he put it on paper, and ta-da!”

Draco was sticking the note to Harry’s desk and peeling it off, his expression gleeful. 

“Here, you can have these. They’re like a quid.”

“Oh, Potter,” he said with a rapturous smile. “You shouldn’t have.”

Was he trolling him? Was he being serious? Harry made a little tetchy noise in his throat. “I can get more the next time I pop down to Edinburgh.”

Draco looked up at him through his lashes. 

“Fine,” Harry groaned. “You can come too, and we’ll go to Waterstones so you can get more trash to read.”

“And stickies!” 

“Sticky notes,” Harry said with an air of resignation. Draco had traveled the wizarding world but was still like a fawn in the muggle one. 

“Stickies,” Draco said crisply. “That’s cuter. He should have named them that.”

Harry shook his head. “They’re not called that, though. If you ask for that, the shop person won’t know what you’re talking about. You won’t pass.”

Draco shrugged. “Maybe I don’t want to pass.”

Tilting his head, Harry had the sensation that they weren’t talking about covert operations in the muggle world. But he didn’t want to press it, so he confined himself to: “Really?” 

Draco was back to sticking and unsticking the note, this time to his hand. 

“I don’t know if I’ve ever passed, not really,” Draco said eventually, his tone serious. “Maybe for a bit at school, but since then, it just seems stupid to cut bits off yourself to fit into a box that you don’t even like. I mean, here,” he gestured around at the classroom, “it’s all professional, of course, but I’m quite sure my students intuit my preferences.” 

Draco paused again. “I think the rainbow flags all over my classroom tend to help, but,” he shrugged again. “Maybe it’s the introductory session on how we’ve got to read diversity and inclusion from in between the lines of history written by straight, white, cis men? And I’m certainly a white man, so they’re probably guessing between the straight and cis, unless they’ve just assumed I’m extremely liberal or generous, but they know I’m a Slytherin, so they probably assume it’s out of self-interest, and then most of the children probably aren’t thinking that deeply about it. Regardless—”

“Do you want to come to the WAWFAN meetings?” Harry burst out. “I think they’d really like having you.” 

Draco’s face went lax.

“Are you sure?” He said, almost in a whisper.

“Yes,” Harry said. “You’re—” and then he was stuck. He couldn’t exactly say, I want you there, and he also couldn’t say you’re a flamboyantly gay man, and we haven’t got one of those at the meetings because Bastian is polyam and Mervyn is about one thousand years old and I don’t know think he even knows students have clubs, but Harry didn’t want him to think he just wanted to tick off the “gay man” box or something, and then his thoughts were getting all twisted and too much time had passed so he just. Left it there. 

Draco was blinking. “I would love to.”

“Right,” Harry said, pulling out his agenda. “There’s a meeting every Tuesday after dinner if you’re interested. Usually my classroom, sometimes the Room of Requirement. It just depends on what the agenda is. Wait, let me check, oh, yes, it’s in the Room of Requirement next week.”

Draco had pulled out a small silver cigarette case and tapped it with his wand, which emitted a small purple cloud of smoke with floating green lettering. 

“What is that?”

“Oh,” Draco said, halfway to putting it back into his chest pocket. “It’s an organizer?” 

“What?” 

“Like the one I gave you for Christmas?” he said and tilted his head. “Though if you prefer to use the muggle version, I don’t want to impose.” He gestured towards Harry’s paper agenda, which was covered in scribbles and correction fluid and, oh God, a doodle of Minnie from some meeting. 

Harry turned over the small silver case in his hand. He’d left Sirius’s—organizer, he thought, rolling the word around his in mind—in his dresser drawer, wrapped in a sock Dobby had given him. 

“My parents gave mine to me when I turned fifteen, but organizers are on the list of banned items because Filch had this absurd idea that you could use them to cheat in exams, which, of course, you can’t. Unless you’d modified the magic somehow.” 

The front had Draco’s monogram and the back had the Black family crest. It looked like there had been another coat of arms, Malfoy, Harry assumed, to balance out the design, but it had been effaced.

“I wanted them to put the Slytherin crest,” Draco sad in a petulant tone. “But you can’t win them all.”

Harry decided to overlook that statement and said, “I thought you gave me Sirius’s cigarette case. I just thought it was stuck closed. I didn’t know it did anything.”

“Oh,” Draco said, his eyes round. “I suppose I ought to have explained. They’re a bit old-fashioned. And a bit …” He paused and considered his words, which made Harry apprehensive. He almost never stopped halfway through a sentence. “Posh, perhaps? Like, in my year, Blaise didn’t even have one. Pansy didn’t either. I think the Greengrass girls had them, but … they aren’t common, let’s say that.”

Harry snorted. “Posh sounds about right.” 

“Potter, don’t be ridiculous. I’d bet fifty Galleons your father also had one.”

“What? My dad?”

Draco sighed. “Potter, your father’s family is old wizarding blood. And rich, too, after Fleamont’s inventions.”

“What?”

Harry felt a bit like a broken record, but he was just really confused. He knew his dad’s family was rich, but like, they were also immigrants, and desi, and wizarding high class was like, posh white people who would have gone to Eton if they’d been Muggle.

“It’s probably in your family vault.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Harry said. “My dad’s family came here after Partition.”

“My research shows that they immigrated in 1757,” Draco said.

“What?!”

“Honestly, Potter! Do you know nothing about your heritage?”

“No!" Harry roared back. "My mum's white family raised me and the last thing they wanted to talk about was the fact that I was brown!" 

Draco's mouth went a bit slack and he said quietly, “1757 is when the East India Company solidified its rule in the subcontinent. There was a large migration from the upper classes of Indian wizarding society, with many of those who had trading connections going to where they—”

“That's speculation,” Harry said irritatedly. “You don’t really know that it’s true about my family in particular.”

“Merlin,” Draco said, and stormed out. 

Just like him, honestly, to make Harry’s family revelations all about him, such a fucking white man move—

Oh, he was back.

With a file folder.

Slapping it down on Harry’s desk, Draco said tersely, “Here.”

Harry undid the bands and opened it. There were magical duplications of documents written in spindly old handwriting, a magical photograph of a dignified and elderly couple labeled “Monty and Effie”—were those his grandparents?— and snippets from the Daily Prophet and other wizarding newspapers, all about the Potdar family and then the Potter family, his parents’ wedding announcement, and—_why the fuck did Draco have all this stuff? _

Draco was looking towards the window. “I came across it as part of my research into immigration into wizarding Britain before the nineteenth century.”

“A lot of this stuff’s like, more recent,” Harry said, pushing the photostat of his parents’ wedding photograph towards him. 

Draco picked it up gently and watched Lily and James beam. He had his hands around her waist, and she was clutching her bouquet, and then behind them were Remus and Sirius and Harry’s grandparents and the Tonkses and Minnie, caught in an eternal loop of throwing rice into the air. 

“I’ve never even seen that one before.” Harry was trying the swallow the lump in his throat. “Where’d you find it?”

Draco took a deep breath. “Your family has always been well-regarded and rather rich, and then they became famous after Fleamont's successes, so there’s usually a file on them in archives.”

Harry nodded. But that didn’t mean that Draco had to like, request that file. Or make copies. Or save those copies. “Why?”

“It’s for my next book?” Draco said a bit faintly.

“What?” Harry’s mind went white with rage. If Malfoy thought he could write a history of Harry’s family without telling him, he had another thing fucking coming. “How dare—”

“Oh, no, not like that!” Draco yelped. “No! It’s about narratives of immigration and emigration. Not about like, the Potter family.” 

Harry subsided. 

It was still weird. 

“Well,” Draco said, “And I kind of figured that you weren’t super into archival research and if I ever ran into you again you might want to know that this stuff is out there, so.”

He shrugged, as though it made his admission less meaningful. 

Harry shuffled through the papers. “Well, I hope you know you’re not getting this back,” he said eventually.

Draco took a breath, sighed, and said, “Yes, fine, I’ll have the imps work up some magical photostats.”

“Thanks.”

“I’ll let you know when I need it back,” Draco said. “The archive location is written on the back of each copy; in case you want to go see the originals.”

“Oh,” Harry said. “I wouldn’t know how to do that.” He still had occasional nightmares about Madam Pince.

Draco pinched the bridge of his nose again. “It’s not that complicated, Potter. Look, the next time we’re in London, we’ll go to the British Library. I’ll show you. It’s really not that difficult. You can probably find loads of interesting muggle things for your course, too,” he said, almost as an afterthought.

“Thank you.” 

Draco shrugged. “It’s nothing, really.”

“No, it is.”

Draco was finding the flagstone very intriguing suddenly. “I’m rubbish at a lot of things in the real world,” he said quietly, “but I’m quite good at research. And it’s just … anyway. Let me know if you need help with the organizer. And see you in the faculty meeting next week.”

“Or you could come up for a brandy later?”

“Oh,” Draco said, his cheeks quite pink. “I’ve a lot of marking, actually, since I’ve been working on the novel, and—”

“No, no, it’s fine, don’t worry.” Harry panicked. It was supposed to be a casual invitation. But why was Draco blushing? Did he think it meant something more? Did he think Harry wanted to thank him in some lewd way? Just inviting him up and dropping to his knees and—Harry blinked a few times. 

Draco had vanished.

That seemed like the conclusion to a lot of their meetings lately—Draco gone, Harry sweating and confused and a bit disoriented. 

Right, Harry thought, and turned to the folder again. 


	15. A Disastrous Invitation

The WAWFAN meeting with Draco was a success. He’d sidled in five minutes early, poured himself a cup of tea, and settled into an armchair at the back. He didn’t push in or make himself known, but when Justin crowed, “And we have a new face, so let’s all welcome Professor Malfoy,” he did a little wave. And then he was mobbed after the meeting. Harry could barely see his blonde hair popping out from the crowd of students surrounding his chair. 

Harry shrugged. Let Draco have his moment. They’d come back to him eventually.

It was strange, he thought. Four months knowing this new Draco Malfoy. He’d been snarky, sure, cocksure, prickly, and defensive, but he was also good with kids, firm but encouraging, put thought into his Christmas presents, had written Harry a fucking novel and brought him information about his family he’d never known— 

Harry realized everyone was staring at him. The kids surrounding Draco had parted, and Draco was looking expectantly at Harry.

“Yes?” he said, clutching his teacup.

Draco smiled blandly and said in a measured tone, “They’re curious about sexual education—”

“Sex ed, Professor Malfoy, it’s called sex ed,” Britney interrupted. “We did one session in primary, but it was really rubbish and all about abstinence, which, like,” she rolled her eyes, “is really ineffective, props to like every study ever.”

Harry found himself nodding along before realizing that Britney was always at the bottom of him doing something completely ridiculous.

He wasn’t going to be putting condoms on bananas in front of Malfoy.

“Well,” Harry stretched out the word to give himself time to think. “I believe Professor Malfoy and I can assemble a panel who can speak to, uh, any questions you might have.” 

Draco smiled. 

God, he looked like a shark when he attempted a full-mouthed grin.

Harry felt sweat break out on his forehead.

The WAWFAN meeting was not a success. It had been a terrible idea to invite Malfoy. 

Fuck, he was going to have to go buy condoms and dental dams in Edinburgh as demonstration objects. God, probably on the same trip that Malfoy had talked him into. Maybe they could just grab some stuff at Boots quickly and GTFO.

And then Elspeth opened her mouth to ask if they could maybe go on a field trip and Malfoy had freaking agreed. 

Harry wanted to crawl behind the divan and die. 

Malfoy was nodding along like there was nothing he’d enjoy more than a chaperoned field trip to some kind of clinic in Edinburgh. 

It was time to put his foot down. 

“Let’s start with the panel, alright,” Harry said with a murderous glare at Malfoy. He’d reverted to Malfoy, the malicious bastard who liked to drag him into these awkward situations. 

Or better yet, Professor Malfoy.

Professor Malfoy was currently smiling and staring down at his tea as the students trailed out.

“What the fuck, Malfoy?” Harry hissed the minute Justin had dragged Perry away from the biscuit plate.

Professor Malfoy raised his eyebrows and looked innocent.

Harry groaned inwardly. He was sure that little moue was how he’d wheedled a teamful of Nimbus 2000s from his dad. It was just this side of pitiful.

He steeled his heart.

“We, are, not,” he said, poking Malfoy in the shoulder between each word, “going, on, a, sex, field-,” poke, “-trip, with, students.”

“Oh, but you wouldn’t mind with just me?” Malfoy purred.

Harry pulled his hand back. 

He wouldn’t—no, that wasn’t what he meant—imagine Malfoy at some kind of—

Malfoy rolled his eyes. “Honestly, Potter.”

“You’re the one who suggested!”

He shrugged. “It’s fun watching you get all flustered. I can practically watch your thoughts get all stopped up.” 

“Fuck right off,” Harry told Malfoy. He was tired now. “I’m an Occlumens, and you don’t know shit about my thoughts.”

“We can pick up a few things when we’re in Edinburgh next,” Malfoy said, completely ignoring Harry, throwing his legs up over the chair’s arm. “When we go for the stickies. And my books.”

“You’re a menace.” Harry shut his eyes. Maybe it would all go away.

“It’s good to have examples. God, can you imagine Minerva demonstrating the general principle behind a dildo?”

“I don’t think we need to demonstrate,” Harry said through gritted teeth. “I think they can figure out what it’s for, generally speaking.”

“Maybe it ought to be a whole school thing. Fourth-years and above.”

“Oh, yeah, good, Malfoy, let’s just plan a huge event without even bringing it up at a faculty meeting. Great.”

“I wasn’t aware that one, you ever paid attention to procedure and protocol, and two, were even conscious during faculty meetings.”

Harry’s eyes snapped open. “How could you forget the dazzling lap dance I gave you when you tried to shoot down my DJ proposal? That was at a faculty meeting.”

Malfoy shut his mouth, opened it again, and came back with, “That’s a singular example that disproves my second point in only one instance. You usually don’t give a shit.”

Harry shrugged. “Still counts, Mr. Malfoy.”

“Doctor Malfoy,” said the twat with a snooty wiggle. “I’ve earned a PhD and a Doctor Magicum.”

“You’re a cum doctor?” Harry said, before his brain could stop his mouth.

Malfoy exhaled slowly. “It’s an abbreviation of Doctor Magicorum, or doctor of magic. The word magic is plural, but it doesn’t really translate well into English. Magics? Doctor of magics? See, it sounds awful.” He paused for a moment. “I’m not surprised you never learned Latin, but frankly, for anyone with a magical education, it should be mandatory.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, whatever, like they ought to learn French, too.”

“They should!” Draco sat up straight and began practically shouting about how students needed to learn multiple languages when they were young, and wizarding kids and muggle kids learned languages in primary school or through their at-home tutors, and how it was stupid to throw away multilingualism at the young age of eleven, and, besides, there were magical schools in other countries and they could do proper exchanges if they knew other languages. 

Harry let it wash over him as he watched Draco’s hands stab the air.

“It was completely mortifying when the students from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang discovered we only learned English at Hogwarts! Mortifying! Luckily I spoke French so I was able to make friends with a few of the Beauxbatons boys—” 

“Oh, come off it, Malfoy, you don’t speak French.” 

Harry had guessed correctly that this would only infuriate Draco further, as the blond man drew himself up and then began hissing sibilant French words, rather like an angry little goose. 

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Harry said and then continued in Parseltongue, “I can speak two languages too, Malfoy, so up yours.”

Draco shook his finger angrily at Harry. “That’s cheating! You can’t just hiss!”

“Parseltongue is a language.” Harry said in English. “The language of snakes.”

“Exactly! You can’t do an exchange with a snake school!”

Harry snorted. “Yeah, but you were just trying to get into some French boy’s pants, so—”

Draco was spluttering. “I was not! I was trying to promote cultural exchange!”

“Mhm,” Harry said, “exactly. That’s exactly what you wanted to exchange.”

“Get your brain out of the gutter, you slimy little git!” Draco yelped. 

Harry burst out laughing. “That’s your best insult? You sound like you’re about twelve, Malfoy.”

Draco retreated to the depths of his armchair and crossed his arms. 

Eventually, he ground out, “I am trying to be a kinder person.”

Harry made a little unamused sound.

Draco continued slowly, “Eileen suggested that I try to be less critical. Of myself. And of others.” 

He’d gone to see Eileen?! So quickly? She usually had a waiting list for months! 

“I am,” Draco admitted with a shaky breath, “starting small.”

This seemed like it was too much, and Harry noticed the mask dropping back into place. The small, vulnerable Draco was replaced by the swaggeringly slick Malfoy. 

“Besides, Potter,” he said with a smug little smile, “I did get into Jean-Antoine’s pants, so cultural exchange works.” 

“Jean-Antoine!? What kind of a stupid name is that?” Harry suddenly hated him. 

“It’s French,” Malfoy said, tossing his head. “He’s one of the deputy curators at the Louvre now, so it comes in handy when I’ve got to do research in Paris.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Harry said. The Louvre was stupid. Art was dumb. Fuck the French people and their fancy foods and all that shit. He didn’t need anything other than bangers and mash, but mash was actually from South America, and he’d read recently there were over one hundred kinds of potatoes in Peru. 

“Glad you got to see Eileen,” he said finally, when his brain was back on track. 

Draco hummed and stood. He didn’t seem to want to continue the conversation, because he brushed some imaginary dirt of his dark green robes and said with finality, “I’ll come up with two people for the panel, and you provide the other two.”

Harry groaned and dropped his head into his hands. 

When he looked up, Malfoy was gone. Again.

It was almost like the git could apparate inside the castle. Or maybe he just walked really fast and really silently. That seemed like the kind of skill you’d pick up if you had to live with Voldemort and his intimates. 

Harry wandered through the halls back to his room with his mind tangled with the problem of the sex ed panel. How had he gotten himself into this? Right, Britney. And Elspeth. The two of them were a disaster waiting to happen. But he already knew they’d both pass the O.W.L. with flying colors. He hoped they’d keep on for the N.E.W.T. level. And then Justin … 

Thus occupied, he unlocked the door to his room and found none other than Ron Weasley in his armchair. 

“Ron?!” 

Ron leapt up and grabbed Harry into a huge bearhug. “Harry!”

“Why are you here?” 

He rolled his eyes and said, “Auror mission in Hogsmeade. Just a B&E, but it’s a bit of a twist, so they sent me. And Blaise. Guess he’s probably—upstairs? downstairs?—visiting Malfoy. Where’ve you been? The elves brought me tea, proper scones and all that, so I’ve been happy, but where were you?”

Harry noticed the remnants of a jar of clotted cream and a pot of jam sitting near a plate. 

“I had the WAWFAN meeting. And then Malfoy and I got into a bit of a tussle because he agreed that we should like, have a sex ed panel and that we should go on a fieldtrip to Edinburgh to like, a sex store?!”

Ron’s eyes widened. “What the fuck, mate?”

“Don’t worry,” Harry said, shaking his head. “I talked him down to just the sex ed panel. But now I’ve got to come up with two people for it.” 

He groaned and dropped into the armchair, lazily waving his wand and transforming a shoe into a chair for Ron. 

“Think the house—er, fuck, sorry, just elves—would do up some more scones for me?” Harry nodded, and gestured to the bellpull by the fire. Ten minutes later, Ron had another plateful of scones and a cup of tea, Harry had a piece of treacle tart with cream, and they had settled in for a plotting session. 

“Neville, d’you reckon?” Ron said, around a mouthful of scone.

“Ron, he’s ace, he’s not going to be interested in a sex ed panel.”

“Right, right. Yeah, Charlie’s said the two of them write a lot. About being ace, and other things. Dragons and plants, probably.”

“Ginny? She’s famous enough to ensure a small crowd.”

“Ah, mate, she’s off on the American tour right now. Won’t be back until May.”

“Fuck, she’d have been good.” 

“You know,” Ron said slowly, “I bet you Luna would be good at it.”

Harry raised his eyebrows. “Luna? The one who thinks the earth is a parallelogram that rests on the back of a turtle? That Luna?”

“Mate, the earth is flat.”

“Oh my God, we’re not having this argument again.”

“It is!”

Harry rubbed his forehead. “Why do you think Luna would be good?”

“Right,” Ron said, putting down his scone. This was serious. “So, she’s super proud of being a lesbian, right, and she doesn’t care if people ask stupid questions, and she knows a lot about tantric sex magic.”

“Ron, I don’t know if—”

“Hear me out! So she cornered me at a family dinner one time and was telling me it’s all about aligning your auras and shit, not like, positions or whatever, so like, there’s probably a couple of kids who are super into that, and then you balance her out with like, Hermione. Who’s all in there with the facts and teaching them about condoms and Plan B. Perfect. Panel sorted.” Ron leaned back in his chair with his scone, satisfied.

Harry closed his eyes for a minute to imagine it. 

“You know, that actually might work?”

“No need to thank me,” Ron said, “Just a small banner with ‘sponsored by the brains of Ronald B. Weasley,’ on the front of the podium, like.”

Harry tched and took another bite of tart.

“I mean, that way it’ll be balanced no matter what nutcases Malfoy brings.” 

Ron laughed. “If it’s Malfoy, he’ll want to outdo you in the coolness factor, so he’ll bring, let me see … Blaise and … what’s the girl? Parkinson?”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Blaise is like, what, a ministry official?”

Ron put his scone down and leaned forward. “Blaise is an Unspeakable. I think he’s like, head of some division or something. They sent him up here with me because he’s the Ministry’s expert on magical jewels? Ah, shit, maybe I wasn’t supposed to say that. Don’t tell anyone,” he said, pointing a finger at Harry. “I mean, I trust you, but don’t tell anyone anyway.”

“What, what happened?”

“Ok, really not supposed to tell you this, but we were called up for a B&E, and it’s like, this horribly cursed jewel? That someone in Hogsmeade was uh, working on?”

“What? Like there’s a dark wizard in Hogsmeade?”

“Uh, not exactly,” Ron said, “There’s uh, someone who like, fixes shit. That’s all I can say. But anyway, it got stolen. Which is bad. Because it’s pretty cursed.”

“Do you think they’re like, bringing it here?”

“Oh, no, no, no, there’s no suspicion that they’re bringing it to Hogwarts. Probably took it off to London or something to try to sell it.”

Harry got up and tried not to pace. “And you and Blaise are on the case?”

“Yeah, I’ve the most experience with dark artefacts, thanks to you, mate, and Blaise is good at the jewelry stuff, so, yeah. We’re working on it.”

The not-pacing was working. Just a few short steps to and fro, and he felt so much calmer.

“Harry, stop pacing,” Ron said.

Well, maybe it was pacing.

“Look, the Ministry is on the case. We don’t need—” Ron broke off and cracked his knuckles—“civilians worried about it.”

Harry stared at Ron. “I’m a civilian?!”

Ron pressed his lips together and then said, “Yeah, technically, you’re not an Auror, or in the Ministry, so you’re a civilian.”

Harry was definitely pacing now. 

“Look, Har, I’m not trying to like, cut you out of something. The kids at the castle definitely aren’t the target here.”

“Does Hermione know about this?”

“Harry,” Ron said with a sigh, “please take a breath. It’s going to be ok. It’s just a B&E—it’s got nothing to do with Hogwarts or Voldemort or anything. This is like, low-level shit.”

Harry turned to Ron. “Oh, low-level shit, huh? That’s why they’ve called out the Deputy Head Auror and the Unspeakables’ evil jewelry expert? For a routine B&E?”

Ron was rubbing his forehead. “Just, please, mate, leave it.” 

“I’m not a dog, Ronald,” Harry said. 

“Look, Harry, honestly, don’t worry about it. Please. For me.”

Harry narrowed his eyes. “Fine. But if it ends up here, you’re buying me a massive cake. German chocolate. Just so you know.” 

Ron rolled his eyes and said, “Ok, yeah, sure, fine. It won’t.” 

The rest of the evening passed unremarkably. Harry acted surprised when Ron pulled out his portable wizard chess set and tried to keep his mind on the game. 

There wasn’t anything to it.

Nope, nothing at all. 

Everything was just peachy.

It wouldn’t hurt to ask Draco if he’d heard anything from Blaise, though. 

Just for safety’s sake.


	16. Plotting

The next day, Harry slid into the seat beside Draco at lunch and whispered, “We need to talk.”

Draco continued buttering a piece of bread and raised his eyebrows. 

“Are you propositioning me at lunch, Mr. Potter?”

“God, what, no?!”

“Ah, what a disappointment,” he said, and put the bread down. “What is it?” 

“Wait, you think that’s how I’d—”

Draco waved his hand. “Joke, Potter, let’s move on.”

“Right.” Harry had lost his train of thought. He reached for a sandwich. “Right, yeah, we’ve got to talk. My room, after dinner.”

Draco shut his eyes and exhaled through his nostrils. “Do you know how hard it is to not say something filled with innuendo right now,” he said flatly. “You’re inviting me to your room after dinner to talk.”

“Come off it, Malfoy, like that would work.” 

Draco’s jaw twitched.

“You’re more of a wine ‘em and dine ‘em, I’m sure,” Harry said around a mouthful of sandwich. “Fancy champers and all that shit. Caviar. Silk sheets.”

“Ah, Mr. Potter,” he said with a little sigh. “If only that were true.”

With his eyes shut, Draco looked younger and more vulnerable, like one of those paintings of dead saints. He was almost peaceful. If only until his mouth opened again.

Draco’s eyes snapped open.

“Watching me, Potter?” 

“As if,” Harry said, and grabbed another ham-and-cheese sandwich. “You look weird.”

“Oh, how deeply offensive,” Draco said with a little sigh. “Have you been de-fanged recently? You used to be a much more worthy opponent, though you were never particularly talented at verbal sparring.”

“Excuse me?! Have you forgotten the infamous ‘you don’t have to call me sir, professor’ incident of double potions, ninety-one?”

Draco waved his hand again. “A momentary shock of genius. You must have briefly channeled the spirit of Oscar Wilde.”

“I thought you were trying to be kinder,” Harry shot back. “Anyway, come to mine after dinner.” 

“Fine, Potter, I shall succumb to your brutish advances.” He fluttered his eyes and treated Harry to a lazy smile.

“Right, fuck you, Malfoy, I have marking to do,” Harry said, flushed and irritated, standing and grabbing another half-sandwich for the road. 

How did Draco always manage to do his head in? It was like no matter what Harry intended to say, or even said, Draco had his whole mind made up about the encounter and would twist Harry’s words around until he didn’t know what was happening and Draco could sink in his little fangs for the final kill. Honestly. Luckily, he was twenty-six and Draco couldn’t really ruffle him anymore.

Totally unruffled, he turned back to glance at Draco, whose white-blonde hair glowed the long beams of light that penetrated the Great Hall. 

Entirely uncaring, he narrowed his eyes. Why did Malfoy look like an angel at a distance?

Completely unbothered, Harry walked into a wall.

Eight hours later, Harry was bumping Jeezy’s ‘Soul Survivor’ in an attempt to irritate Malfoy before he even arrived. Sure enough, when Draco opened the door, an expression of distaste crossed his face before it settled into a bland mask.

“This man has a gun in his drawers?” Draco said when Harry lowered the volume. “I didn’t know they called them drawers in America.” 

Harry rolled his eyes and said, “Right, sit, Malfoy.”

Draco curled into Harry’s armchair like it was his.

“Did you see Blaise yesterday?”

“Why? Are you jealous, Potter?” Draco smirked and examined his hands. 

Harry rolled his eyes. “I mean, he’s a really fit bloke, so I wouldn’t mind being with him—”

Draco sat up. 

“Anyway, that’s not the point. The point is that he and Ron were here for a B&E in Hogsmeade, but what was stolen was a piece of cursed jewelry.”

Draco let his head fall back against the armchair and groaned. 

“Potter, why do we care? That’s Auror stuff.”

“They could bring it here! Curse one of the students!”

“Right,” Draco said. “I think you’re being a bit …” he trailed off and studied Harry, who had begun pacing again. Mostly because Draco was in the only comfortable chair. Not because his blood was racing through his veins. “Paranoid?”

“I am not paranoid,” Harry hissed. “Cursed jewelry isn’t fucking good, Malfoy.”

“Of course not! I just fail to see why a local robbery means that you’ve assumed it’s going to end up at Hogwarts. They’ve probably already taken it down to Borgin and Burke’s or it’s on its way to Shanghai or Moscow.” Draco shrugged. “I don’t see why it’s our problem.”

Harry stopped and folded his arms. 

“You don’t see why a piece of cursed jewelry disappearing from nearby a magical school where a high-profile former Death Eater and the Boy-Who-Lived have just been hired to be a little … uh, shall we say, suspicious?”

Draco huffed. “Fine, Potter, maybe a concerned parent who just happens to be a cat burglar took it and they’ll throw this cursed necklace at me in the Great Hall.” He still didn’t seem terribly bothered.

“You aren’t afraid?”

Draco shrugged again. “Maybe a bit, but one, there’s nothing we can do, and two, I have it on good authority that it’s a …” he trailed off. 

“Wait, how do you know it’s a necklace?”

“Lucky guess?” he said with yet another shrug. It was practically a shoulder workout.

“Tell me what Blaise told you,” Harry said, leaning over Malfoy. He could be intimidating when he wanted to be.

“It was a private conversation between friends,” Draco said. “I fail to see why I should tell you anything.”

“It concerns both of us! And I told you what Ron said to me!”

Draco sighed. “It doesn’t concern either of us, Potter.”

Harry turned away for a moment, and then whirled round and cast a sticking spell that glued Malfoy to the chair.

“I won’t let you go until you tell me,” he said, his eyes blazing.

“Honestly, Potter,” Draco sighed again. 

“Hey,” Harry said, magically lashing Draco’s wand arm to the armchair with silken black ropes. Harry hadn’t meant for the bindings to look that sensual. That’s just how it had come out. It didn’t indicate anything.

Draco hummed and tested his bond. “Really, Potter, you ought to ask first. My safeword is peppermint.”

“Malfoy!” Harry shouted. “Concentrate! Tell me what Blaise told you!” 

Draco exhaled with the air of a long-suffering child who’d been denied pudding even after eating all of his vegetables. 

“Fine,” he said, his gaze fixed firmly on his bonds. 

“One, Blaise said a necklace cursed with some kind of sexual spell was stolen from the Oliver-Winger residence last night. Two, he was alerted to this around six in the evening, but the family first noticed it had gone missing around five. Three, he and Ronald arrived on the scene at six-thirty, boring police questions were asked, etc., the full details to which I am not privy.”

Harry growled. “Why does Audrey have such a dangerous necklace? She’s got kids for Christ’s sake.”

“I hardly know what that woman is thinking at any given time. She’s just about as loony as Lovegood.” 

“Don’t start in on Luna, you don’t—”

“Anyway, you might be right,” Draco interrupted. He started ticking numbers off on his right hand as he continued, “One, what are Audrey and Talbott Oliver-Winger, respectively Defense against the Dark Arts professor and Head Auror doing with a cursed sex pendant at their home? Two, who knew about this? Three, who was talented enough to break into what is, I assume, a very warded house? Four, why were Ron and Blaise called up here to deal with what should be a routine B&E, if not for the nature of the object in question?” He paused for a moment and then said, “Something’s not quite adding up here. Perhaps you’re onto something, Potter.”

Harry muttered, “Thank you,” a bit sarcastically.

He flicked his wand at Draco and the enchantments ended. Draco immediately began massaging his wrist. He was such a drama queen, Harry thought irritatedly. He hadn’t bound him tight enough to hurt even a bit.

“Glad I could be of assistance,” Draco almost purred, his eyes demurely downcast. “Even if you did have to tie me up rather than just ask politely.”

Harry grumbled and fiddled with his wand. 

“Anyway, Malfoy, what are we going to do about this?”

“Finally, you appreciate my ability to plan,” Draco sighed. “I mean, we can start with some reconnaissance work regarding our fellow associate, because I, for one, am not quite sure how she got the job in the first place, and then we’ll go from there. Do you still have your little magical map?”

“It’s called the Marauders’ Map,” Harry said through gritted teeth. “It’s actually quite a complicated piece of spellwork and my dad and his friends were really advanced for their age to be able to figure it out.” 

He stalked to his bedside table and opened the drawer. _Ah, fuck, didn’t want Malfoy to see everything in there_. He grabbed the map and spread it out on his desk.

Bending over it, he realized that Draco was suddenly right behind him, practically leaning into him as he craned his pale neck to look at the moving dots. 

“My,” Draco whispered. “This really is quite impressive.” 

“Thank you,” Harry whispered back. 

Then for some reason, he opened his mouth again and said, “I used to watch you on it.”

“What?” Draco whispered back, his eyes wide. 

“To make sure you weren’t doing anything evil!” Harry almost shouted. Why did things just leap out of his mouth around Draco? 

“Right,” Draco said with a nod. “I’m sure.” 

He seemed pleased, though, and bumped his hip against Harry’s as he leaned in again for a closer look.

“Too bad it doesn’t include Hogsmeade,” he said finally. “I don’t see her dot anywhere.”

“We’ll have to go there, I guess,” Harry said. “Maybe we ought to go now.”

“Potter, don’t be ridiculous. It’s half-ten. I’m not going to run about like I’m a student wrapped up in your silly little invisibility cloak with you peering in Audrey’s windows.”

Yet, fifteen minutes later, that’s what they were doing. 

The invisibility cloak hardly fit two grown men, and Harry had to stoop over to ensure that their feet didn’t just appear where there shouldn’t be feet. It was impossible to walk in synchronization with Draco, who seemed to alternately be pushing closer to him and then trying to inch as far away from him as possible, and Harry was just about to lose his temper when they arrived at Audrey’s house.

“Stop moving so slowly,” Draco hissed. “You keep running into me.”

“It’s not meant to be for two adults,” Harry hissed back. “You can’t walk that fast.”

Draco huffed a little. Harry saw his breath crystallize into the night air. “Fine,” he said, and squished up against Harry. “Just hold onto me and I’ll set the pace.”

Harry wasn’t really sure where he was supposed to hold on—shoulders was going to bring the cloak up too high, and Draco’s elbows would pull it back from the front, so he just waited, hovering his hands about until Draco whispered, “Waist, you idiot,” and then Harry thought, _well, fine, I will do that,_ and put his hands on Draco’s waist. There was a little sound from Draco, one that Harry didn’t really understand, but he was trying to concentrate on following the leg movements and didn’t really have much brainpower to untangle how Draco smelled vaguely woody and clean at the same time. He hoped he wasn’t holding on too hard.

They saw the Oliver-Winger home, dark and quiet among the snowdrifts. Creeping up on the left side, Draco stopped abruptly. Harry bumped his chin into the back of Draco’s head and cursed.

Draco made a few wand movements and the exterior wards became visible, shimmering gently in the dark night. 

He hummed a bit and said, “Right, we’re going to have to be invited in. This is really advanced spellwork.”

“Can’t we just, you know, go through?”

Draco laughed. “Yes, if you want them to wake up immediately. It’s the magical equivalent of sending a herd of Erumpents trampling through the library. I can’t untangle these wards standing in the snow, Potter.” He sounded a bit like Hermione when she got irritated.

“Oh, damn,” Harry said. He felt a bit daft, standing in the snow with his feet starting to get damp and his hands on Draco’s hips. Maybe he should move them back up again. But that would be admitting that they’d slid down. 

“Ugh, let’s go back,” Draco said. “My warming charms aren’t that good and my feet are going numb.”

“Oh, shit, right,” Harry said. He’d completely blanked about warming charms. He cast a quick one over the two of them.

Draco hummed a little.

They set off towards the castle, no closer to the bottom of the mystery than when they’d started. But Harry did kind of know what Draco smelled like, so the evening wasn’t a total failure. 

Wait, since when had he wanted to know that?


	17. A Birthday Party

They didn’t have to wait long for an invitation to the Oliver-Winger household. Audrey announced at the next faculty meeting that her daughter Alina was turning eleven on the eleventh, and that they were all invited down to their cottage for a bit of cake.

“As many of you know, we’ve decided to hold her back from Hogwarts a year because she’s still getting outbursts of temperamental magic, but she’s rather glum about another year at primary even though she’s halfway through already and it would be just lovely if you all could come and get her excited about next year!”

Audrey beamed and tucked a strand of her whitish-grey hair behind one ear. Here wand was sticking out of a messy bun. 

“Please, no presents! Your presence is present enough,” she said and giggled.

“You’d think she came up with that,” Draco whispered to Harry. His breath was hot on Harry’s ear. 

Then she bobbed her head a little bit, seemed to forget she was holding a teacup and attempted to clap, spilled tea all over herself, and started laughing. Minerva sent a drying charm her way as she sat.

“Honestly, she’s like an overeager Crup,” Draco continued. “Do you think she even knows what Unforgivables are?”

Harry didn’t want to turn his head. He could feel Draco’s hand against his upper arm, pressing through his robes. Each of his fingers was shooting fire into Harry. Clearly, he had some kind of heat regulation problem.

“Professor Malfoy—” Draco abruptly moved away, and Harry felt cold—“has proposed some changes for the History of Magic curriculum.”

“Yes, Headmaster,” Draco said smoothly, sending out paper geminios around the table with a list of his proposed changes.

“You’re getting rid of _A History of Magic_?!” Harry shouted as he read the proposed cuts. 

Draco sighed, and said, “Yes, regarding point four in quadrant two, as Professor Potter has brought to our notice, I would like to do away with Bagshot’s archaic and mythologized text. I have instead proposed a curriculum that relies less on superstition and folklore and more on the historical interactions between the magical and muggle worlds.”

He rose and waved his wand, sending an almost opaque blue cube into the center of the table. Seconds later, a transparent red sphere joined it. As they bumped alongside each other, Draco continued, “For years, we’ve been trained to see magical and muggle history as two separate entities, with muggles—” with a flick of his wand, the blue cube sent spikes into the red sphere—“interfering in our affairs, thus situating wizards as the victims. However, historical research has demonstrated that the two worlds have been interlaced for thousands of years.” 

The edges of the cube and the sphere began to meld together. 

“Each world has, at various points, vilified the other, but we are much more interrelated than the current Hogwarts curriculum allows for. In order to propose these changes which will, of course, involve eventual Ministry participation, I have adapted Professor Potter’s seven-point curricular reform plan for the subject of History of Magic, at all levels.”

Harry blinked. How did Draco know about that? Hadn’t he been in Europe, swanning about libraries and writing books? Harry had updated him on the general revisions to the O.W.L. and N.E.W.T. tests, but he hadn’t mentioned how he’d overhauled the entire Muggle Studies curriculum. 

Draco shot Harry a quick smile. “I have, of course, improved greatly on my fellow professor’s organization—” ah, there it was—“but I appreciate the blueprint he has laid down for curricular reform.”

The rest of the faculty burst into questions, but Harry’s head was buzzing from Draco’s backhanded compliment. 

After the meeting, Harry caught up with Draco in the hall. “Ta for the name-dropping, even if you couldn’t resist dragging me a little.”

Draco pressed his lips together. “It’s hardly my fault if you turn out to be competent occasionally.”

Harry laughed, and shoved him a little bit. “You complete git! You think my curricular reform plan is good!”

“I hardly think it’s bad, since I used it as the basis for my improved curricular reform plan,” Draco said with the hint of a smile. “Don’t get cocky, Potter.”

“Anyway,” Harry said, lowering his voice, “we’ve got an invitation now. We can just poke around a bit and see what’s up.”

Draco nodded, his face suddenly serious. “Yes, but we’ve got to take precautions. We shouldn’t search alone at the house, in case they’re actually dangerous undercover dark wizards dressed up as a seemingly ordinary country wizarding family.”

Harry narrowed his eyes. “I can’t tell if you’re trolling me or not.”

“You’ll just have to wait to see if I trail you all over this little celebration, won’t you?” Draco asked, his eyes twinkling. Harry had to blink to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating. A twinkling Malfoy. Would wonders never cease?

Harry could hardly stand still the day of Alina’s birthday party. Audrey hadn’t been acting any differently; her dot was always in logical places on the map; he and Draco had both made it through several weeks without having any encounters with cursed jewelry. They’d been spending evenings in the library searching for sex-related necklaces in the former Restricted Section, now open to all students, except for the really dangerous books, which Mrs. Hardbroom kept in little cages behind the reference desk; they hunched over desks and whispered to each other until late into the night. It felt a bit like a research project with Hermione. 

(He hadn’t wanted to discuss any of this with Eileen; the strange camaraderie of having a mutual mission had done wonders for Draco’s prickliness and Harry didn’t want to have to examine why tracking down this purportedly missing cursed necklace was so important to him. Or the paranoia that had started this whole mission in the first place.)

Around seven, the faculty and staff gathered in the Great Hall and set off towards Hogsmeade. Harry noticed several of them were attempting to hide gift bags and wrapped presents and felt guilty. Audrey had specifically said no presents. Twice. Minnie had her present—which looked like a book—tucked unashamedly under one arm.

The Oliver-Winger cottage was brimming with kids and family. The Hogwarts professors slid in and bunched around the snacks table. Audrey bustled in and flapped her hands at them to disperse. 

Harry found himself in a corner with a potted plant, looming over a little brown-haired girl on a divan. She looked up at him and said seriously, “It’s my birthday.”

“Oh, er, happy birthday. You must be Alina, then.”

“Yes,” she said, and blinked her bright lilac eyes slowly. 

Harry felt a bit unsettled by her stare and said, “Your eyes are purple.”

“My father’s are red and my mum’s are blue. We’ve all got purple eyes,” she said, “Me and Claude and Viv and Benny.” She scowled. “Mum says it’s because we’ve got some of each of us in them.”

Harry’s throat felt a bit tight. “Yep, that’s how it works. I’ve got green eyes like my mum, but I’ve my dad’s hair.”

They were both silent, watching the hubbub and commotion of the party swirl around them.

“My parents died when I was little,” Harry said, and then felt shitty for mentioning it. “But it’s nice knowing I look like both of them.”

Alina nodded at him and said, “I guess that is nice, then. My parents aren’t dead. Yet.”

“Haha, yikes,” Harry laughed. “You’ve probably got a lot of time.” 

She shook her head solemnly. “You never know. That’s what Dad says.”

“I didn’t bring you a present,” he admitted.

“That’s alright. Your presence is enough.” She said it with the same cadence as her mother. 

“Do you know who I am?”

She nodded. “Obviously, you’re Harry Potter. I’ve read the book about you.”

“Uh, what book?” Harry said with a shaky laugh. Surely Audrey wouldn’t have allowed her offspring to read the salacious Rita Skeeter faux-biography. 

“The one by Luna Lovegood.”

“Oh, right, that’s fine.”

Luna had authored a young adult biography about Harry, the only publication he’d allowed in his postwar fame. She’d done the illustrations, too.

“You look better than her drawings,” Adina said seriously.

“I’d agree,” Harry heard a smooth voice say, and he realized that Draco had come up with a glassful of champagne.

“Piss off,” Harry said, and then said all in one breath, “Don’t tell your mum I said that.”

Alina was mouthing ‘piss off’ with a look of unadulterated glee on her face.

“What a good influence you are, Potter.” Draco smiled and turned his attention. “Happy birthday, Miss Alina. I’ve brought you a potions book.”

He passed her an unwrapped dark green tome stamped with _Potiones for Begynners _in gold letters across the front. 

“Start at the beginning,” he said seriously. “And don’t attempt the ones in chapter five until you start Hogwarts with Professor Patil.”

Her face lit up and she said, “Thank you, Professor Malfoy,” and then buried her face in the book, flipping to chapter five immediately. Harry felt a hand on his elbow steering him towards the drinks table.

“She’ll start with chapter five,” Draco said with a smirk. “But those are the antidotes, so,” he gave a little wiggle and handed Harry a glass of red.

“Wait, how do you know?” And how did he know Harry preferred red wine?

Draco shrugged. “The Wingers are genetically incapable of following directions.”

“God, you’re like the Mafia, aren’t you?”

“How am I like an organized crime syndicate?” Draco paused with his glass halfway to his mouth. 

Harry snorted. “You just know shit about everyone and everyone’s families.”

“The Wingers are a member of the Sacred Twenty-Eight. I had to memorize that shit for my father,” Draco said with a grimace. “I know almost everything about Talbott. His mother fled from his father when I was little. I heard she died soon after. Killed by Death Eaters. Probably as revenge for taking Talbott. I think he went to a wizarding orphanage after that. His dad went to Azkaban.” Draco continued in a low voice, “I hardly think this is birthday party conversation.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this before?” Harry hissed back, his sweaty hand sliding around on the stem of his wine glass.

He glanced over at Talbott Oliver-Winger, a man whose hair and skin were the same tawny light brown. He had high, sharp cheekbones and was wearing a full suit and bowtie. He smiled at his wife, then cast his glance around the room. When it landed on Harry and Draco, the smile vanished. 

He did have red eyes. Even at this distance, Harry could tell that they were the color of blood.

“Fuck,” Harry whispered. “I don’t think he likes you, mate.”

“Maybe he doesn’t like you,” Draco said lightly, refilling his glass. 

“Yeah, doubt that,” Harry said with a wince. “Look, Malfoy, it’s a perfect set up for revenge—he gets this cursed necklace, pretends it’s stolen, somehow it ends up at Hogwarts, smuggled in by Audrey or something, and you get cursed.”

Draco shrugged. “Won’t be the first time.” 

“What?” Harry hissed again. “Why didn’t you bring this up before? This might have been,” he exhaled through his nose, “helpful and relevant information.”

“Oh, not Winger specifically,” Draco said, “But I’ve been cursed before. I have a few more counterhexes in my arsenal than I did last time. I’m not scared.”

He lifted his chin and looked straight at Harry. With his mouth set in a firm line and his nose upturned, Draco looked every inch the haughty Malfoy heir Harry had met in Madam Malkin’s. But he could see Draco’s glass trembling, knocking the bubbles off-kilter as they streamed upwards. 

“Don’t worry,” Harry said, “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

Draco closed his eyes for a moment.

Harry didn’t know what else to say, so he downed his glass of wine.

There was another moment of silence before Draco broke it with a little cough and said, “Shall we go for hors d’oeuvres, Potter? It looks like there are some vol-au-vents, and of course, enough shrimp for you to stuff your face several times over.” He moved lightly across the room away from Harry, but Harry felt himself drawn after him as though he were on a string. 

Several plates of shrimp later (Harry really needed to control himself, but he could finally eat the fancy crustaceans he’d spent hours preparing for Petunia’s dinner parties), Harry burped behind one hand and said, “So, Malfoy, if we’ve been invited in, why don’t we just not leave? Would the wards know?”

Draco shrugged. “Probably not, but who’s to say. I doubt the head auror would be unable to detect a disillusionment charm.”

“But an invisibility cloak?”

“Merlin, you brought it?!” 

“Just in case,” Harry said in a low voice. “It seems like that’s our best bet. We’ll say goodbye and then we’ll go around the corner of the house, still in the wards, put the cloak on, sneak back in, wait ‘til they’ve all gone to bed.”

“Where is it?”

“Uh,” Harry said. “It’s sort of shoved down the back of my robes and half down my trousers.”

Draco wrinkled his nose. 

“I mean, I can get it out without taking my trousers off.”

“Oh, what a disappointment,” Draco said with a little pout, staring at his champagne.

Harry swatted him. 

“It’s a stupid, foolhardy plan, Potter.” 

Draco finished his champagne and licked his lips.

“I’m in.”

Three hours later, after a spirited argument with Filius regarding the relative merits of CDs versus the Frog Choir (“nothing can compare to the bass of synchronized croaking!”) and an off-key bellowing of Happy Birthday (to which Alina sat, smiling, with her fingers in her ears, before blowing out her candles), he and Draco had managed to conceal themselves in the invisibility cloak inside the Oliver-Winger’s front closet. 

“I don’t see why we’ve got to hide in the closet as well,” Harry mumbled. 

Draco elbowed him and turned his head halfway around to glare at him. There wasn’t room for more.

Harry could feel the house settling and falling silent. There was only Draco’s breathing. And Harry’s own heartbeat, which seemed to have migrated into his head.

Maybe this idea was really, really stupid.

He was hiding in a closet with Draco Malfoy, who was pressed against him. Harry was getting a crick in his neck, but he couldn’t tell how much time had passed in the darkness. His left leg started to prickle when Draco elbowed him again and began to ease open the closet door.

But Draco moved a bit too fast for Harry’s leg, and the hood of the invisibility cloak caught on his neck before the rest of his body could catch up, and then he was falling, pushing Draco to the ground accidentally as they were tangled up in a cursing, yelping heap.

And then a lamp clicked on.

Looking up, Harry and Draco saw Audrey and Talbott Oliver-Winger, seated next to each other on the sofa, wands out. The golden lamplight did nothing to soften their expressions. 

“Tell me why I shouldn’t curse you,” Talbott said calmly. “You’ve got thirty seconds.”

“Uh,” Harry said, when Draco broke in and said, “We were making out in your closet and didn’t realize everyone had left.”

Harry couldn’t look at Draco. He was still laying on top of him. 

“In an invisibility cloak,” Audrey said. Her blue eyes were icier than he’d ever seen them. 

“Draco’s still in the closet,” Harry heard himself saying. Everything felt very far away. “Literally, apparently.”

“Unconvincing, given the introduction to his book.” Talbott flicked his wand, and then Draco had shot out a jet of light, and Audrey was firing back, and all Harry could think to do was to shout “Expelliarmus!”

He found himself holding only one other wand.

Since Audrey had her wand aimed at Harry’s forehead, and Talbott had his at Draco’s neck, the wand could only be Draco’s. Fuck.

Draco closed his eyes and said slowly, “It was all my idea. Blaise told me about the cursed necklace that went missing from your house, and because of my past, I convinced Harry that you’d use it against me, so I talked him into—”

“Draco, shush,” Audrey said, pointing a finger at Harry. “Don’t move.”

Why had Draco completely lied about everything? But he’d called him Harry. He’d said Harry. Not Potter. Harry.

Even though his face was glowing, Harry felt a tingle of ice down his back.

She moved behind him. He didn’t want to breathe. He could smell the sweet waft of her perfume and a woody, spicy smell, and then she was ripping his shirt up and putting one hand down the back of his pants and—

“What the fuck?” Harry yelled and tried to leap away from her.

“I got it!” Audrey whispered gleefully.

Hanging from her fingers was a rather phallic pendulum that glowed with a pulsating red light. 

Audrey’s eyes were wide and determined and she said in an undertone, “I can feel an Alina outburst all over this … must have ended up in the closet somehow … and then we didn’t know where …” she waved one hand at the other three and went back into the kitchen. 

Talbott dropped his wand from Draco’s neck and settled into an armchair.

Draco and Harry collapsed into opposite ends of the sofa.

Talbott rested two fingers on his temple and tilted his head to watch them. “Boys,” he said with a sigh, and Harry was briefly offended until he realized that yeah, if he were a dad and the head auror, he’d have called himself a boy too, “You shouldn’t underestimate my wife.” 

There were several loud bangs, one remarkably sharp and short incantation, and then acrid blue smoke seeped into the living room.

“I—uh, sir—we are extremely—” Harry began when Audrey bustled back into the room, levitating several pieces of the pendant in front of her.

“You’ll have to tell Ron tomorrow, love.” 

“Did you denude its power?” Talbott said hesitantly.

“Oh, yes, of course,” she said with a shrug. “It wasn’t that hard because it’d tried to attach itself to someone who’s already got his eye on someone, and then I grabbed it before it managed to latch itself onto anything vital.” 

Harry was trying to keep up and said, “Uh, what was that?”

“That,” Audrey said, almost reassembling the piece so they could see its original form, “is a sacred amulet of Priapus.”

“Oh, fuck,” Draco said quietly.

Harry shot him a confused look.

“Harry, my dear, it’s a kind of sex amulet. It seeks out, shall we say, unresolved sexual tension? And then it makes you irresistibly horny until you’ve, you know, done the deed to completion several times. The problem is that the Romans didn’t really understand the concept of consent in the same way we do so,” Audrey shuddered and continued, “I picked this one up from a black market dealer in Romania when we went out to visit Charlie at Christmas, but I haven’t had a spare minute to put the final set of enchantments on it in order to neutralize its power, and then it just disappeared!”

Her husband smiled at her. 

“I’ve been worried sick, being so close to Hogwarts! Usually the wards here keep everything in, but,” she made an angry little huffing noise.

“Love,” Talbott said, one hand consolingly rubbing her arm. “We can’t be prepared for every contingency of Alina’s magical outbursts.”

“I know,” his wife groaned, dropping the pieces into a silver casket on the mantle. “I just hope she starts growing out of it soon.” The lid snapped shut with a booming sound out of place for such a small object.

At Harry’s confused look she said, “It goes directly to the Unspeakables’ archive. They process it and put it into the vaults for research purposes.”

“_You_ work for the Unspeakables?” Draco said, surprise evident in his tone.

Talbott pinched the bridge of his nose.

Audrey blinked at Draco several times and wound a long strand of silvery hair around her index finger. “Oh, my dear. How did you think I got this job?”

Draco cleared his throat and looked miserable.

“Really?” Talbott said. “You broke into our home without even adequately researching my wife?” Harry noticed that he didn’t even mention himself as a threat. Somehow this flower-bedecked, blue-lipstick-wearing, chubby middle-aged woman in a pink and lavender muumuu was more of a threat than the Head Auror?

Draco blushed. 

Audrey summoned four cups of tea and settled in on the floor, leaning her cheek against her husband’s knee.

“When I was at Hogwarts, we had a wonderful DADA professor. Patricia Rakepick. God, she was lovely. She had hair just like your Ron,” she said with a nod at Harry. She stared off into space for a few seconds until Talbott prompted her gently with “Your brother.”

“Oh, yes, so my older brother Jacob had disappeared before I got to Hogwarts. He’d somehow got entangled with the Cursed Vaults,” she paused, but neither Harry nor Draco gave any sign of recognition, “you know, secret chambers filled with big nasties to guard various Hogwarts treasures.” She took another look at them but nothing rang any bells.

Harry took a sip of tea and was surprised that it was exactly how he liked it. He glanced over at Draco’s cup, which was black. Fuck, she had been watching them. 

“Long story short, Rakepick trained me, Bill Weasley, and Merula Snyde, you know, Perry’s mum? She’s an Unspeakable now?” Harry blinked. Perry was the child of all-around badass Merula Snyde? The witch who’d taken down a record number of Death Eaters? Perry was so … floaty. Harry had known they had the same last name, but he’d never really connected the dots.

Flapping her hands, she continued, “We were all supposed to be mini cursebreakers. But when we entered the vault with the dragon in it—” Draco gasped—“it turns out she’d abandoned my brother inside a cursed oil painting! And then she left us to deal with this dragon, completely alone! Disappeared! Like that!” She snapped her fingers.

“We thought we were all working together for the good of the school, but she was only out for herself.” Audrey sighed and blinked a few tears from her lashes.

Talbott had one hand on the back of her neck, and he picked up the story, “Audrey spent her last two year at Hogwarts training, breaking into the cursed vaults and getting into a lot of trouble, and then she became an Unspeakable after graduation, right when I was training to be an Auror. But,” he said, with a painfully gentle look at his wife, “she doesn’t like hurting people, so after a year and a half, she went into cursed object reparation. Then Minerva approached her for the DADA position.”

“It’s just not right to put children in these horrible situations!” Audrey hissed. “You two know better than anyone how awful it is to be small and to have people depending on you to do things that you shouldn’t know how to do for years, if ever at all!”

Harry felt a pang at that. It was love, always love, that had got him through. 

And Audrey understood that too. 

He felt it shining out of her, coating her house in the strongest magic known to mankind, turning a cottage into a fortress. How had he and Draco ever assumed they’d go unrecognized? 

“It’s called _defense _against the dark arts for a reason,” she said, glaring at the fireplace. “For far too long it was about learning the dark arts, under the guise that knowledge was power against them. But it’s not! All evil things work in fundamentally the same way! You don’t need years of education to know that!”

Talbott shot Harry an amused look. “Darling, not everyone has the affinity you do for dark magic tempered by a stubborn unwillingness to give into it.”

“Just to be clear,” Harry said with a glance at Talbott. “You don’t want to curse Draco.”

Talbott barked out a laugh. “I believe Dr. Malfoy has done more than enough to mend his previous errors. Though I’m not too sure about the several chapters on poisons in the copy of _Potiones for Begynners _he just gave my older daughter.”

“She’ll do antidotes first,” Draco said with a faint smile. “I told her that’s where she shouldn’t start.”

Talbott laughed again. “That’s my girl.”

Then there was a bark from the other room, followed by a hissing noise. 

“Oh, bother,” Audrey said, handing her cup of tea to Talbott with a sigh. “The little ones have woken up.” She rose and padded out of the room. 

“I didn’t see a dog before,” Harry said.

Draco was giving him a strangely intense glare. 

Talbott considered this for a moment, and then shrugged. “So,” he said casually, “I’ll kill either of you if you mention it to anyone,” and Harry felt the magical air shift around the couch, and he knew it was some variant of an unbreakable vow. Talbott’s red eyes bored into him. 

“The children are also Animagi.” 

A silvery Borzoi clipped into the room, a brown puppy dangling by the scruff of its neck. It plopped the whining puppy into a dog basket and curled up around the little one.

“They have trouble adjusting sometimes,” Talbott said, “since they’re not really sure of their bodies in either form. Sometimes Audrey sleeps with Viv like that. It helps her settle.”

“Wait, what?” Harry whispered. He didn’t want to be rude, but this just didn’t make any sense. “Your entire family are …” he trailed off.

“Unregistered animagi?” Draco finished.

Talbott’s mouth quirked into a grin. “Ever since the Death Eaters were so easily able to take over the ministry and get ahold of all its records, I’ve been a bit, shall we say, wary?” His red eyes glowed in the firelight. “There aren’t any long-term deleterious effects! Audrey and I became animagi when we were kids and we turned out alright.”

“But Claude’s at Hogwarts,” Draco said. 

“Minerva knows.” Talbott took a sip of tea. “He’s a husky.”

“Ah,” Draco said, with an air of sudden realization. 

“I don’t want to know what he’s done,” Talbott shook his head. “As long as he doesn’t get expelled.”

Harry found himself nodding along. The Oliver-Wingers were both very odd and very powerful, but their magic was filled with so much love and light that it made Harry ache. He wanted that. He wanted a little cottage filled with kids and a spouse he’d do anything for—anything good and righteous, that was. 

He glanced over at Draco, who had settled back into the couch in a pose quite different than his usual rigid posture. Draco’s hair glinted in the firelight, and he was watching the sleeping dogs with a look of—wait, was that jealousy?

Did Draco want something like that too? 

Harry suddenly felt they were intruding and got to his feet, apologizing and bidding Talbott a good night and thanking him for not just hexing them immediately, when he felt Draco’s hand on the small of his back, pushing him into the dark night.

“God, Potter,” Draco said, when they were meters from the cottage, his breath puffed into light clouds against the midnight-blue sky, “You do go on and on sometimes.” 

Harry laughed and felt magic bubbling out of him and ebbing into the night. He elbowed Draco affectionately and was only slightly surprised when Draco didn’t shove him back. Everything felt softer in the darkness. Softer, and open, and filled with love.

It was the Oliver-Winger’s fault, Harry thought, that’s why he was so filled with these moist thoughts. Entirely their fault. Probably some residual enchantment from that Priapus necklace. Nothing to do with the blonde head bobbing at his side and needling him about his terrible puns and lies.


	18. The Panel

He’d promised Draco a trip to Edinburgh for stickies, novels, and—Harry had to mentally take a deep breath at this part—the props for the sex ed panel. Minnie and the rest of the profs had approved of it immediately. And then it was on the calendar. And then it was next Friday afternoon. Like, tomorrow. 

Harry barged into Draco’s classroom after lessons and said, “We’ve got to go today. We don’t have condoms or bananas or lube or anything—”

Draco and the second-year he was tutoring blinked at him.

“Er,” Harry said. “I’ll just wait outside until you’re done.”

His face flamed. Could have fried an egg on it, he mused, leaning against the stone wall outside Draco’s room.

Five minutes later, the second-year slipped past him with a squeaky, “Professor Potter!” and rushed off down the hallway.

Draco was sitting behind his desk again. “Scarring the minors, Potter?”

Harry exhaled.

“We’ve got to go get … the stuff,” he said.

“Ah, censoring yourself now. Sensible,” Draco said with a quirked eyebrow. “Griffin’s probably going to eat out on that for weeks.”

“What?” 

“It’s slang?” Draco seemed confused. “For the rewards for a particularly good piece of gossip?”

“Maybe in 1937,” Harry said dryly.

Draco waved his hand.

“I’m ready whenever you are,” Harry said. He’d already changed out of his academic robes and was just in a peacoat, boots, jeans, and a hoodie. It was fucking freezing in Scotland in March. The beanie was necessary for keeping his eyebrow piercing warm against the cutting wind.

Draco looked him up and down and shrugged. “I suppose you’re ready for something,” he said, and began to unbutton his academic robes. His long fingers pushed each of the silver buttons through the fabric with a seductive grace—Harry shook his head and concentrated his attention on his cap. Molly had knitted it for him a few years ago, and he picked some of the pills off it. 

“Ready,” Draco said at last. 

Harry looked up and choked.

He’d transformed his robes into a long black wool coat. Under that, he had on a tight black polo neck tucked into black jeans. With black suspenders. And then he was wearing Doc Martens.

It shouldn’t have worked.

Fuck. Harry ground his teeth.

“You’ll need a hat,” he said at last. “We can’t use warming charms.”

“Hm,” Draco said and moved towards the door, “I’ll just take your hat.” He plucked it out of Harry’s hands before he could protest. “You have a hood.”

They stumbled out of the Floo and onto the windy streets of Edinburgh. 

“Don't wander off!” Harry shouted into the wind. 

Draco rolled his eyes and put one arm through Harry’s. “I can’t get lost this way,” he said with a little self-satisfied smile.

“Right,” Harry said again, ignoring the burst of warmth along his left side. “Books first. You’ve got thirty minutes at Waterstones. That’s it.” 

Thirty-four minutes later, Draco attempted puppy-dog eyes, but Harry was resolute. He had already grabbed the sticky notes and added them to Draco’s pile. Twelve mysteries. Draco would be done with those in four days. Fucking brainiac.

And then he ended up paying somehow. Draco glanced down and smiled. 

“Nice treat for your boy,” the till girl said as she ran Harry’s debit card. 

Harry laughed weakly. It seemed too complicated to correct her. Draco didn’t say anything either. 

“Thank you,” he said softly once they were out of the shop. “I can pay you back when we’re at school again.”

Harry shook his head. “Don’t worry about it,” came out rather gruffly.

Draco pulled Harry’s hat down over his ears and swung his bag. Harry hoped the bag was durable. “Stickies!” he said once and continued swinging the bag.

He was cute like this, all rosy and contented, with Harry’s red beanie undermining the rather gothic effect of the rest of his outfit. Draco took his arm again, and Harry’s brain stopped working for a moment.

“Where next?” Draco said. “Can we go to that horrible sandwich shop again?”

“You don’t want to go back to Pret,” Harry said. “We don’t have time, anyway. We’ve got to go get the … things.” 

Draco’s eyes lit up. “Right, the sex ed things!”

Harry wanted to close his eyes and disapparate to Ron and Hermione’s couch. Luckily, Padma and Addie had just been down in Edinburgh looking for some extracurricular aids—Harry suddenly thought, _why didn’t they just get the things for this demo, then?_—but it was a bit late for that. Anyway, they’d recommended a shop. Harry hustled Draco into a taxi and then hustled him out again at the corner before the shop. No need for the cabbie to know too much of their business. Draco had been far too nosy about how the man knew all about how to use the “taxicab,” _thank God he didn’t call it a hansom, _and how he could find his way through the crowded city. The idea of blinkers blew him away. 

“Harry,” he’d whispered, “this man can let the other autos know what he’s thinking.”

“He alright, mate?” the cabbie had said as Harry had paid, glancing at Draco, who was swinging the bag again while waiting on the curb.

Harry sighed. “He doesn’t get out much.” He gave him a ten pound tip.

The shop had dark windows and a lurid pink flourescent sign of a lipstick print. It was in a bit grimier neighborhood, and Harry checked the perimeter as he tucked his wallet away. Draco was oblivious and smiled at a rough sleeper, who looked confused and hurried away. 

Harry grabbed his elbow and steered him into the shop. A bell went off. Draco turned to him with wide eyes. “They know we’re here,” he whispered. “How is that not magic?” 

“It’s a sensor,” Harry said, and then realized he didn’t know how those sensors worked at all and he could just tell that Draco was going to open his mouth and ask, so he pointed at a huge blue dildo and said, “What about that one?” 

“Potter,” Draco said in a reverent tone. “I hardly think the students will be put at ease by a footlong dildo.”

A person wearing a pink t-shirt emblazoned with the same lipstick print appeared from the back of the shop and glided towards them. A big pin proclaimed “they/them,” and their name tag read “Starr.” 

“Anything I can help you boys with?” Starr said, gesturing towards the displays that lined the walls. “Toys? Shoes? Whips? What are you into?”

Harry blanched and gestured towards Draco, hoping that he’d take the heat for his terrible idea.

Draco just sighed and said, “I’m not too sure.”

“No!” Harry hissed. “No! Explain!”

The shopkeeper glanced between the two of them. 

“Fine,” Draco said, shrugging out of his coat and placing it on a nearby counter. He crossed his arms and said in an even tone, “We are two secondary school teachers who have been tasked with coming up with an LGTBQIA-friendly sexual education panel for fourteen- to seventeen-year-olds and we have come to your store to purchase several items to be used for demonstration or as examples of things students may one day encounter or wish to purchase for themselves at some point in the future. When they are of age.”

He shot Harry a look and said snarkily, “Did I miss anything?”

Harry felt a bit faint. “Nope, got it in one.”

“Oh,” the shopkeeper said. “I’m sorry I assumed the two of you were together.” Furrowing their brow, Starr began mumbling and wandered off towards the back of the store.

Draco had leaned across the counter, and Harry had to drag his eyes away from his backside. Colleagues. Right. 

“Do you think they’ve gone off to get us things, then?” Draco said, practically rolling over on the counter.

“Hnnrgh,” Harry said, and sped off towards the whips. Why didn’t they have a gum section or something? He was getting really hot. But he didn’t want to take his coat off, like Draco had. That would be admitting that they’d be here for a while. He closed his eyes for a moment, but the thumping bass of Eve’s ‘Let Me Blow Ya Mind’ wasn’t very calming.

Starr’s voice entered his internal monologue, and he was brought back to his trying reality. 

Starr had an entire box filled with different sex toys, packers, lubes, condoms, harnesses, plastic models of reproductive systems, dental dams, packets of birth control, and they were walking Draco through each of item, explaining pros, cons, what was accurate and what wasn’t. Harry leaned against the counter and watched the two of them. 

Draco’s eyes lit up as he gestured to different items and Starr tried to gauge how to describe it in an age-appropriate terms. Thirty minutes later, Harry was taking a nap on the couch in the changing room. Draco and Starr had it under control. 

He was awakened by Draco, shaking his shoulder gently and saying, “Harry, Harry, wake up.” He blinked and groaned. His neck was totally fucked from this tiny couch. 

Draco leaned back. “Potter, wake up. You’ve missed all of Starr’s lovely explanations.”

“Right,” Harry said, sitting up and cracking his neck. Draco grimaced.

He followed Draco back to the main area of the shop, where Starr was standing behind the counter with a huge smile on their face. 

“I hope it goes well,” they said. “I think I’ve explained everything that’s in there to Draco. No need to bring it back when you’re done. It’ll be better used at a school.”

Harry pulled out his wallet. 

“Oh, no, no,” Starr said, horrified. “I couldn’t charge you for educational tools! They were all just sitting around in the back, anyways. You know, things people returned or whatnot.”

“No, please,” Harry said. “Let us.”

Starr pressed their lips together. Draco looked pained. 

Harry sighed. “Right, Draco, what do you want?”

Draco drew his head back a bit. “I beg your pardon?”

Harry raised his eyebrows. “Just pick something out, alright? Whatever you want.” They had to buy something. And he wasn’t about to demonstrate his proclivities in front of a colleague. 

Starr pressed their lips together again, but this time it was to suppress a smile. 

Draco pinked a bit, but Harry knew he couldn’t resist a present. 

Standing at the counter, Harry rubbed his eyes. He’d really passed out there. He smiled awkwardly at Starr as they waited for Draco to pick something.

And then Draco was back, hands behind his back.

“What’d you get?” Harry asked.

Draco leaned forwards and put a box of black silk bondage ropes on the counter.

Just like the ones Harry had conjured during their heated discussion of the B&E. 

He felt like he was going to pass out.

He vaguely heard Starr say, “Ooh, lovely choice.”

He paid, tipping one hundred percent as compensation for the box of demonstration items, helped Draco into his coat, got them back to the Floo, all in a vague haze. He didn’t feel like he could draw a full breath until Draco had shut his door. 

He didn’t even start to feel calm until after a frigid shower and two tumblers of whiskey. 

Tomorrow was going to be complicated.

The next morning, Harry was hanging about the Floo waiting for Hermione and Luna when a dark-haired figure crashed through. Unfolding herself to a height of barely five three, even in a four-inch heel, Pansy Parkinson brushed ash from her pencil skirt and surveyed him through dark glasses. 

“Potter, lovely to see you.”

She removed the sunglasses and slowly blinked her perfectly-lined eyes at him. “Where’s Draco?” 

“Er,” Harry said. He hadn’t seen her since she’d tried to hand him over to Voldemort. Or hypothetically tried. It hadn’t worked. Harry attempted not to be fussed. “I’m not his keeper.” 

She walked across the room to where Harry had frozen, looked down into his tea cup, wrinkled her nose at his milky brew, and then looked straight up and him and hissed, “If you fucking hurt him, I’ll kill you.”

Harry stumbled backwards, spilling tea all over his arm, just as Draco swanned in with a cry of surprise.

“Pans!”

“Ugh,” she said, “Don’t call me that.” They air kissed, and Pansy snuggled herself into Draco’s side. 

Draco murmured a drying spell towards Harry’s sleeve and gave Pansy a look. Harry was still a bit shaken from her threat and was trying to avoid eye contact with the tiny, terrifying woman. 

Luckily, Luna came through the floo and it took all of Harry’s attention to attempt to untangle the strands of vaginal amulets from her hair. He was trying to politely explain to her that maybe it was best to just give the teenagers the highlights of tantric sex communication and maybe not to wear the aforementioned amulets when Hermione burst through in an explosion of papers.

“Drat!” she cried, summoning them back to her. Luna had taken one of the papers and was reading it upside down. 

“That seems quite unfair to the elves,” Luna said, a harsh tone creeping into her dreamy voice.

“It is!” Hermione said, and then pressed her lips together. “It’s bloody unjust what they’re doing and—”

She noticed Pansy and broke off. 

“Hello, Parkinson,” she said after staring down the smaller woman.

“Granger,” Pansy said and jutted her chin out.

Harry closed his eyes. This was going to be a fucking disaster.

There was a silence, and then Pansy was crossing the room and holding out a hand to Hermione. 

“I admire your work on elf legislation,” she said. Harry blinked. What the fuck was happening? Draco was determinedly staring at the mantle. 

Hermione took the proffered hand and shook it. “Your article about the inhumane working conditions of gillyweed harvesters was groundbreaking,” she said. Harry shot Draco a look. Draco caught his eye and shrugged a little. 

Luna poked Harry in the side and said dreamily, “She wrote a lovely article for the Quibbler, even though nargles are very real.” Harry blinked a few more times. What was happening? How had Parkinson charmed her way into his friends’ circles, and she’d just threatened him? 

Pansy looked over at Harry and rolled her eyes. “Fine, Potter, you too. I apologize.” She turned to Draco and shrugged a little, as if to say, there, I did it. 

Harry had whiplash. 

Then Blaise arrived, Draco pressed handouts with the general outline of the event into their hands and _please avoid these topics_, and then they were in the Great Hall, and Harry and Draco were sitting side-by-side in the middle of the panel, facing hundreds of curious eyes. 

“Welcome—”

“Hello—”

He and Draco spoke into the magical microphones at the same time. Titters broke out across the room.

Harry wished they’d practiced this a bit.

“Professor Malfoy,” Harry said finally, and held out his hand to Draco. 

Draco burst into an explanation about the joys of healthy self-discovery and how they had, in Harry’s class, reviewed the various items potentially useful for sexual encounters, but now they were going to hear from a diverse panel of alumni. Five minute intros, and then the floor would be open for questions.

Hermione’s introduction was exactly five minutes long; she’d timed it on her wand and had just finished her final sentence about being happily married to a cis man when the jangly alarm went off.

Blaise was laconic and said only the following: “I am a polyamorous, nonbinary mage who works for the Unspeakables. You may not ask me questions about my profession.”

Luna rambled on for ten minutes about true love, the joys of finding a partner at a young age, her amazing girlfriend—maybe you know her? She’s quite big in Quidditch, Ginny Weasley (cheers broke out), the most beautiful woman in the entire world, the possibilities of channeling sexual magic to further political goals and acceptance of diverse sexualities, before Harry gently nudged her and she concluded with, “Ah, well, if you have any questions about the relationship between nargles and unreleased sexual energy, please.”

Pansy was also efficient in her introduction, identifying as a bisexual cis woman who’d primarily dated men and who was active in the BDSM scene in London. Scrunching her nose, she said, “Yes, I’ve also done sex work. And no, I’m not going to tell you how much a blowie costs.” 

With a sigh, Draco opened the floor to questions from the audience. 

The first question was from Elspeth, which surprised Harry, until he realized that “What are some commonalities and differences between wizarding and muggle birth control?” was a question he might have written on a practice O.W.L. 

Hermione was out there with facts and statistics regarding the high efficacy rate of the pill when used correctly, how condoms prevented STIs and pregnancy if used correctly, how anyone with a vagina should always pee after sex to decrease the likelihood of getting a UTI (Harry wasn’t sure how that was related to birth control, but it seemed like useful information), how they could acquire Plan B at local muggle pharmacies, and then Luna opened her mouth and dreamily said, “Never do it on the full moon. That’s when the nargles are at the peak of their power, ready to implant a baby into a willing parent.”

Hermione looked a bit confused for a moment, and then swung back into focus with more facts about diaphragms and spermicides. 

Pansy broke in with a stern, “And if they tell you they’re not wearing a condom, go home. Don’t fuck them.” 

Blaise tapped his microphone and said, “That goes for you too, gay kids. No condom, no dice. Many STIs can be cured, but some can’t. Wizards haven’t come up with anything better than a good muggle rubber, so use them.”

“And,” Hermione said, “since we don’t yet have a medicinal form of male birth control, this is something that evens the playing field in terms of pregnancy risk in heterosexual relationships. You both should be participating in safe sex!”

Elspeth nodded thankfully while taking copious notes. Britney rolled her eyes and dragged her back to their seats. 

The next question came from Shuo, who was wringing his hands with anxiety and stumbled over the first few words. “Ms. Granger-Weasley, and anyone else on the panel that this applies to, how do you handle being in an intercultural relationship? Does the fact that you grew up muggle and your husband grew up wizarding have an impact on the day-to-day of your relationship or sex life?”

“Such an important question,” Hermione said with a broad smile. Shuo’s shoulders relaxed. “It was hard to convince Ronald of the relative merits of muggle condoms, but he wasn’t ready to be a father at seventeen, and once I told him it was condoms or abstinence, he got on board pretty quickly. Luckily, nowadays, condoms are relatively well-known and understood in the wizarding world. I think it’s maybe a bit more complicated for me as we’re approaching the decision of when we want to have kids. In the muggle world, it’s pretty physically damaging to the mother’s body, but as you know, in the wizarding world, while anyone can carry a child, it has typically been a female role. And then, add on decades of patriarchal oppression in both worlds, and it’s a risky prospect for a woman’s health and career. In a heterosexual relationship, the woman is expected to stay at home with the kids.”

“Fuck that,” Pansy broke in. Draco rubbed the bridge of his nose.

“Indeed,” Blaise rumbled.

“Anyway,” Hermione continued, “it’s all just a matter of figuring out what you can and are willing to compromise about. When we do have children, Ron has some, uh,” she coughed a little, “particular ideas about under which star signs children should be conceived.”

Luna held up a finger and said, “He’s right! The stars have important effects on our lives, though we humans don’t really understand them—Harry, did you consider having a centaur on this panel?”

Harry stuttered, “Uh, no, maybe next time.”

The questions kept coming and coming and Harry hoped Draco was timing the event, because he’d abandoned Sirius’s organizer in his room and then he zoned back in and realized the panel was talking about how they knew they were in love. 

He’d missed Blaise and Hermione’s answers, but Luna was talking about how she’d realized when Ginny had defended her against some bullies at Hogwarts. 

“It was like she was shining from within, glowing with this kind of righteous rage, and then she came and wrapped her sweater around me, and it was like this mantle of calm descended over us.” Luna paused and rested her head on one hand. “Of course, she was still infatuated with Harry.” 

Harry tried not to make an awkward face. Good, his teenage love life was now a topic of discussion. Great. This was fine.

“So I just kept it to myself,” Luna continued. “I didn’t think it would ever be requited. And that’s just sometimes how it goes. But that’s the person who’s fallen in love’s problem, not the object of affection’s. But then it turned out she did have feelings for me, once she and Harry had realized they weren’t meant to be. And here we are.” She turned to Harry and said seriously, “I should probably thank you for not having studied tantric sex magic, or you might still be with her.”

“Yes, well,” Draco interrupted, “Ms. Parkinson, your response.”

Pansy opened her mouth, closed it, and then opened it again. “I don’t believe in love,” she said finally, “Maybe I haven’t met the right person, or maybe my brain and heart just don’t get it. C’est la vie.”

Before Draco could respond, the student piped up again with, “What about you, Professor Malfoy? Have you ever been in love?”

The air was pressing in on Harry’s ears. 

Draco looked a bit startled and said in a vague tone, “I’ve never had a requited love before,” and then he coughed and broke into some concluding remarks.

Harry was sure he’d gotten water in his ears somehow and missed half of Draco’s response. 

How could Draco Malfoy have never had a requited love? 

He was so handsome and snarky and charming in a kind of shy and yet irritating way, and he dressed well and had a lovely reading voice and was out there educating kids about history and how complicated it was and why being gay was more than ok and he had a great arse in Quidditch leathers, probably great at all times, let’s be fair, and how could no one have noticed all those things in any of the twenty-six years he’d been on this planet? 

Harry watched Draco’s fingers tighten around the microphone and exhaled.

But they were colleagues. Friends. 

Yes, that was it. Friends. 


	19. Ron's Birthday

The following weeks compressed into a repetitive pattern: wake up, eat, teach, spar with Draco at lunch, teach, WAWFAN meetings where he and Draco would argue more, maybe a nightcap with Draco (he needed to buy more scotch), bathe, sleep, repeat. 

Ron’s birthday came around and Harry didn’t even hesitate before sharing the details with Draco. He turned up with a wrapped present (a tin of fancy broom polish, as it turned out), wrapped one muscular arm around Harry (for the Floo, he knew, only for efficiency’s sake), and brushed soot off Harry’s cheek. There were lots of drinks and Harry found himself at half-midnight talking to Dean about love.

“How’d you know about Seamus?” Harry said, a bit slurred.

Dean shook his head, which sent his short dreads out in a fan. “Didn’t know, mate. Didn’t know until he got well pissed one night and I’d brought him back to our flat—we were roommates, remember—and then instead of going to bed, he grabbed me and insisted that he needed a cuddle, so I was like, well, alright, whatever, and then when we woke up in the morning—” he broke off and stared at Seamus, who’d just lit a trayful of shots on fire—“it was like we’d always been together. Kissing him just felt … right.” Dean tipped his head back and took a long pull from his beer. “Like all the pieces of the universe had just slotted together.”

Harry hummed. “You don’t like, regret not getting together sooner?”

Dean laughed. “Oh, god, no. It wouldn’t have been the right time. I had to get my head out of my ass and notice him properly.”

Seamus was cheerfully yelling with Ginny as they downed the flaming shots.

“And I was going to say he had to stop being such a fucking idiot, but like, he’s such a dick,” Dean said fondly as he watched his boyfriend. “He’s going to be so sick later.” 

“I think it’s a contest?” Harry said.

“I think I’m going to go, uh, make sure Ginny wins,” Dean said, getting up from the couch.

The sofa dipped down again, and Harry looked over to find Draco sitting there, just a hair closer than Dean had been. 

“Dean’s been hogging you,” Draco said with his eyes fixed on his beer bottle.

“Didn’t know you drank beer.”

“It’s not half-bad. Once you get past the general flavor profile of piss.”

Harry laughed. “You can’t help it, can you?” He reached out and grabbed Draco’s head, ruffling his hair. Draco yelped and fought for a moment, and then submitted, drawing in a long breath. Harry felt how soft his hair was, watched the rise and fall of his chest and how his almost-clear eyelashes still made little shadows on his pale cheeks. 

Oh, shit, this was too close. Harry let go and scooted closer to the arm of the sofa. Friends. Colleagues. Friends. Don’t fuck it up, Potter. 

Draco sat back up and fluffed his hair with his eyes firmly fixed on the mantel. 

He’d rolled his sleeves up, and Harry was able to see the tattoo on his other arm. It was a bouquet of flowers—narcissus, lily of the valley, poppies, roses, lilacs, carnations, all tangled together and weaving their way up his arm. It must be a magical tattoo, Harry mused, as two tattooed bees drifted in and around the flowers. 

He tilted his head to watch the petals.

Draco caught him staring. He didn’t roll down his sleeves.

The rest of the party passed with a few more beers, a few more pieces of pizza, and a few more desires to touch Draco’s hair. The latter were not indulged. 

Then they were stumbling back through the hallways, hissing at each other to be quiet and not wake up the students, muffling drunken giggles. Harry kept trying to yell, and Draco kept sort of leaping up to try to put his hand over Harry’s mouth, and Harry was taller but Draco was faster. 

And then they were at Harry’s door. Which meant that Draco had missed his door. And then Harry had a moment of clarity and he’d reached out and grabbed Draco’s arm. His bicep was firm and warm in his hand, beneath Draco’s woolen robes.

“I think I want to kiss you,” Harry said. The words sounded very loud and his mouth was very dry.

Draco hummed a bit and fluttered his lashes. 

Everything felt hot and slow. 

“Can I?” Harry said, tilting his head in preparation. 

They were so close. He could see the dark flecks in Draco’s grey eyes. He could feel his own heart beating in his head. Draco’s pink tongue peeped out and licked his lips. He was radiant in the torchlight. The brightest thing in the dark hallway. The brightest thing in Harry’s heart.

And then Draco was gone, and Harry was standing there, holding the air.

“Not like this,” Draco had said. 

Harry rested his head against his door for a long time before he finally went into his room. 

“Not like this.”

His sheets were crisp and cold and empty.

“Not like this.”


	20. He Finally Reads the Book

The words echoed through Harry’s head all night and into the next morning.

“Not like this.”

He couldn’t think about anything else. _What had Draco meant? Not like this, like, not because Harry was drunk? Because Draco had been drunk? Because he wanted to be wooed? Because Draco didn’t feel the same? _His head spun with the possibilities.

His fifth-year Ravenclaws and Gryffindors kept pestering him as to why he hadn’t marked their papers, and he finally cracked and lost his temper and shouted a bit at Elspeth, who burst into tears. Britney took her hand and glared furiously at Harry. 

“I’m sorry,” he said, feeling hollow. “I’ve just had a lot of realizations recently about my personal life, and I’m being very unprofessional. It’s not your fault, Elspeth. I’m so sorry. Take the rest of the period free.”

He put his head down on his desk until he’d heard them all go.

But when he raised his head, Perry was there. 

“It’s alright, sir,” Perry said. “Professor Malfoy’s been a right tit today too.”

Harry’s jaw worked for a moment. “I don’t think you should speak like that about my colleagues,” he said finally, because it seemed like the Thing He Was Supposed To Say. Even though the information made him want to shout triumphantly. He hadn’t been imagining things. Things _had_ changed last night. And they were affecting Draco too. 

And he hadn’t even realized how much he’d wanted to kiss Draco, and now it was all he could think about. And it was doing his head right in. 

“Not like this,” he mumbled, and then realized Perry was still there. “Uh, is there something else you needed, Perry?”

Perry shook his head and loped off, saying, “Just wanted to make sure you knew that.”

The next three weeks were absolute torture. Draco seemed to be actively avoiding him and would duck out of rooms whenever Harry entered them. It was like the beginning of the year. Harry felt like his skin was crawling off with the amount of longing that he was doing. Padma teased him endlessly. Even Addie had joined in, ribbing him that he was only avoiding Draco because he wasn’t sure if he could keep his hands off him.

And the horrible part was that she was right.

Harry wanted Draco so badly. It was like a huge, flaming hippogriff of desire that threatened to overwhelm him, and he didn’t know if Draco wanted him back. It was like some switch had flipped and all the things he’d been noticing and not noticing about Draco suddenly signified that he, Harry James Potter, was irredeemably attracted to Draco Malfoy. 

But he still wasn’t sure what Draco’s whispered words had meant, or why he was avoiding him. 

The avoidance seemed to indicate that Draco didn’t want him.

But then when they’d accidentally catch each other’s eyes at a faculty meeting, Draco would turn crimson. And that seemed to indicate something else. 

And once when Harry had been staring a hole into the side of Draco’s head at dinner, Draco turned, smiled, panicked, frowned, and then rushed out of the Great Hall.

It was completely untenable to live like this, Harry thought as the Easter holidays drew to a close. He’d spent a week housesitting for Ron and Hermione, who’d fucked off to Ibiza (and not invited him, he thought crossly), and when he’d returned to Hogwarts, he’d been ordering all his food to his room, panicking about running into Draco in a studentless castle. Each time he saw him, he was filled with the most horribly animalistic desires—and Harry was terrified, terrified that he’d hurt Draco, that Draco didn’t want him, that Draco could somehow read his mind and see all the depraved things Harry wanted to do to him, with him. 

He’d never felt like this.

Ever. 

He was starting to understand how love could be a dangerous thing, untrammeled, unchecked—so he’d started doing some meditation and yoga and was working on his breathing and going to therapy, but then he’d catch sight of Draco and have to count to seven and grit his jaw.

Harry felt as though he was losing his mind.

And then it was Teddy’s birthday, and Harry walked in, saw Draco in jeans (jeans! Black jeans! Tight black jeans!), promptly blacked out, and had absolutely no memory of the party. He must have not been too odd, because he’d received a lovely thank you note from Teddy with a photograph of him and Teddy eating cake and they both looked normal enough, not as though one of them was a sex-deranged fiend lusting after a coworker. Andromeda sent him a letter than inquired when he and Draco (why? Why couldn’t she invite him separately?) would be free for dinner. He crumpled the letter and banged his head on his desk. Ulula, his owl, pecked consolingly at his hair and hooted softly.

One Sunday, pacing his room like a caged tiger (he didn’t dare to go out flying, for fear of running into Draco in Quidditch leathers), Harry remembered Hermione’s words—_why don’t you read his book?_—and rifled through his trunk, coming up with the book. The cover had gotten creased somehow (Hermione was going to kill him). He took it in one hand and flipped to the introduction.

_Fascism steals lives, _it began. _It preys upon the weak and those who feel weak, promises them they will be strong because they are better than others—better than those who deserve to be eliminated. It promises a bright future once the messy business of cleaning up the present is finished. It promises renewal, strength, passion. And each promise is a lie written in blood._

Bit dramatic, Harry thought with a grimace. 

_ Fascism attracts those who believe that sacrificing others will bring purity, perfection, and prosperity. Oswald Mosley, a prominent Muggle fascist between World War I and World War II, told his supporters, the Blackshirts, that Jews, communists, and the Labour Party had brought the downfall of the empire. Once they had been eliminated, the United Kingdom would shake off the economic downturn of the Great Depression and become a world power once more. The Death Eaters, followers of Tom Riddle, alias Lord Voldemort, who took control of wizarding Britain during the Second Wizarding War, viewed Muggle-born witches and wizards as inferior. Once they were excised from the population, wizardom could return to a mythologized past that never existed._

_ But fascism depends on actors for the passive verbs. _

_ I was one of those actors. I was a Death Eater. _

Harry heard himself gasp. There it was, in black and white. Published. Written. 

He skimmed the next few paragraphs, where Draco laid out the series of forces that had influenced his decision to become a wizarding fascist, chief among them the desire for his father’s approval in the face of paternal homophobia. 

_This book examines what encourages the growth of fascist organizations through the lens of their followers. But it also considers how revolutionary leaders can strike at the heart of these pernicious and evil alliances. _

_ My own story, which is not the focus of this historical study, anecdotally demonstrates the conclusions I reached while writing this book. Once I realized that my father’s ideology was fundamentally hollow, and that nothing I could ever do would win back his love, it became clear—the opposite of fascism was not another political ideology. It was love._

_ Pure-hearted, unconditional love. A love that expects nothing in return. The kind of love that drives individuals to sacrifice themselves for others. _

_ When Harry Potter walked into the forest to face Lord Voldemort, I did nothing. When he returned, seemingly dead, I did nothing. When he burst forth, radiating love and justice and power, I could only throw him my wand, a paltry effort in fighting a monstrous evil. He showed me the meaning of courage, of honesty, and of love. _

_ I dedicate this book to Harry, to all those who dared to fight beside him against hatred, and to those everywhere who have stood against fascism and through their love, starved it of its life. Your love has saved us all._

A tear fell down and obscured the last word. Harry watched it wrinkle the page (Hermione was definitely going to murder him) as though he were floating above his body. 

Draco loved him. 

It was all there in black and white.

Draco loved him.

And he’d written it out for the entire world to see.

In a history book, no less. 

“Not like this.”

It meant not drunk, not when it could be written off as an accident or a mistake. It meant Draco wanted him with his body and soul, to love and be loved in return. 

Harry dropped the book and ran to Draco’s quarters. He pounded on the door. 

Draco opened it, blinking slowly. He was wearing a green silk robe and his hair was sticking up on one side.

“Harry?” he said, his voice a bit groggy. “Are you alright?”

“Never been better,” Harry responded, his voice cracking. He wiped his tears and smiled. “I finally read your book.”

“Oh,” Draco said, and flushed. He pulled his robe closer around himself. “And?”

“I didn’t realize,” Harry said. “That you loved me.”

Draco smiled then, a soft smile that grew into a beautiful beam. 

“I can’t believe I didn’t realize it—” Harry said, raking his hands through his hair (it didn’t make it look better, but Draco didn’t mind). “I kept saying we were colleagues.”

“You’re an idiot,” Draco said gently. “And I am too. I couldn’t tell you to your face, not even after all these years.” 

Harry found that his face was wet again. 

“I could write it in a book, but I couldn’t ever say it to you,” Draco said, his grey eyes fixed on Harry’s green ones. “I’d never be worthy. You’re so, so good.” 

Harry stepped forwards and touched Draco’s cheek. Draco turned and rested his head in Harry’s palm, his face finally peaceful. 

“Hey,” Harry said, tilting Draco’s chin up. His grey eyes fluttered open. “You’ve become good. You’ve fought so hard to become so good.”

And then he was leaning forward, pressing his lips against Draco’s, and when Draco’s mouth opened beneath his, it felt like coming home. It was like soft yellow light and the perfect cup of tea and warm blankets wrapped around him. He had his world and his future in his arms. They’d both fought so hard, and they’d found peace and resilience in each other. It was a gentle, breathing magic that wrapped itself around their beating hearts. It was love. It couldn’t be anything else. And Harry knew that, ten years later, all was well. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! If you leave me a comment, I'll probably cry about it from sheer happiness and leave you a mostly incoherent reply. ♡ ♡ ♡
> 
> Want to saturate yourself in the songs I listened to while writing and all the historically-accurate early 2000s music referenced and also look at a graphic/cover I made? [here u go](https://ebbet.tumblr.com/post/189296551543/but-thats-history-playlist)


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